ABSTRACT
Chickpea, groundnut, and pearl millet are three important climate smart crops of the semi-arid tropics with their ability to cope with slightly harsh temperature and soil moisture-deficit stress conditions to provide diversified nutritious diets to consumers. The last decade has witnessed the development of different molecular marker systems leading to the construction of genetic maps, identification of molecular markers linked to genes/quantitative trait loci for desired traits and their use in breeding programs. In recent years the progress in whole genome sequencing techniques has facilitated the use of new genomics assisted breeding tools such as genomic selection (GS) for improving complex traits in crops. The advantage in using genomic selection over other genomics assisted breeding methods, is that it considers all the major and minor alleles effects to predict genomic estimated breeding values that enhance selection intensity as well as accuracy and have 84tremendous potential to accelerate the rate of genetic gains especially for complex quantitative traits. In all three crops, development and validation of GS models are in progress. The current chapter provides insights into the development of GS training populations, case studies of GS for target traits and GS prospects in all three crops.
