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Lennart Olsson, LUCSUS

Lennart Olsson

Professor, Docent

Lennart Olsson, LUCSUS

Perennials as Future Grain Crops : Opportunities and Challenges

Author

  • Elizabeth A. Chapman
  • Hanne Cecilie Thomsen
  • Sophia Tulloch
  • Pedro M.P. Correia
  • Guangbin Luo
  • Javad Najafi
  • Lee R. DeHaan
  • Timothy E. Crews
  • Lennart Olsson
  • Per Olof Lundquist
  • Anna Westerbergh
  • Pai Rosager Pedas
  • Søren Knudsen
  • Michael Palmgren
Show all

Summary, in English

Perennial grain crops could make a valuable addition to sustainable agriculture, potentially even as an alternative to their annual counterparts. The ability of perennials to grow year after year significantly reduces the number of agricultural inputs required, in terms of both planting and weed control, while reduced tillage improves soil health and on-farm biodiversity. Presently, perennial grain crops are not grown at large scale, mainly due to their early stages of domestication and current low yields. Narrowing the yield gap between perennial and annual grain crops will depend on characterizing differences in their life cycles, resource allocation, and reproductive strategies and understanding the trade-offs between annualism, perennialism, and yield. The genetic and biochemical pathways controlling plant growth, physiology, and senescence should be analyzed in perennial crop plants. This information could then be used to facilitate tailored genetic improvement of selected perennial grain crops to improve agronomic traits and enhance yield, while maintaining the benefits associated with perennialism.

Department/s

  • LUCSUS (Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies)

Publishing year

2022-07-29

Language

English

Publication/Series

Frontiers in Plant Science

Volume

13

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Frontiers Media S. A.

Topic

  • Agricultural Science
  • Environmental Sciences related to Agriculture and Land-use

Keywords

  • breeding
  • domestication
  • genome editing
  • grain crops
  • perennial agriculture
  • perennial grains
  • perennialism
  • species-wide hybridization

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1664-462X