Congratulations to Adrian Brennan who has just published his latest paper in MDPI.

Chickpea was one of the first domesticated plants from the Middle East and is now one of the most ımportant food legume crops in the world. This study deals with breeding climate resilient chickpea by introducing useful gene variants from its wild crop relatives. We focused on flowering time variation as early flowering varieties can avoid late summer drought and high temperature. We grew ten families derived from different wild-cultivated chickpea hybrids in the field in Southern Turkey and analysed flowering time data to determine the number of genes contributing to variation. We also measured and analysed genetic markers to identify the genomic locations of the major genes influencing the trait in two of these families. We found evidence for between one and three major genes influencing flowering time in each hybrid chickpea family that will contribute to future breeding efforts. This paper is the outcome of a successful collaboration between researchers at Durham University Biosciences and Harran University Field Crops Department who teamed up with two Syrian researchers exiled in Turkey, supported by the Council for At Risk Academics (CARA) Syria Programme.

The full article can be read here

Further Information:

Find out about the Department of Biosciences at Durham University

Visit Dr Adrian Brennan's staff page at Durham University

Image: 2006 Luigi Rignanese