ABSTRACT
Wheat is second to rice in world importance. It provides protein, minerals, and vitamins as well as complex carbohydrates. It is the main food staple of 35% of the world’s population and provides almost 20% of their total food calories. Global demand for wheat will grow faster than that for any other major crop and is forecasted to reach 1.1 billion tons in the year 2020 (1), creating a challenge for molecular and conventional breeding. Wheat or its ancestral progenitor species was grown as a food crop as early as 8000 B.C. (2). During its early domestication important traits such as free threshing, nonshattering, and a move toward a more determinate growth habit were incorporated, and wheats changed from the emmer types to the common and durum wheats of today. In recent years different types of wheat have been bred for particular end uses: hard red for bread, durum for pasta, soft wheat for cakes and pastries, and white wheat (hard or soft) for noodles, bread, or pastries. A great deal of effort in wheat breeding has centered on improvement of quality characteristics for particular end uses. This, coupled with breeding for agronomic characteristics such as yield, resistance to lodging, pest resistance, and earliness, were the major focus of the world’s wheat breeding programs in the 20th century. The introduction of semidwarf varieties that could provide high yields under optimal moisture and fertilizer regimens was the basis of the Green Revolution.
