A Changing Climate on Research on Adaptation Resilient Traits - Experience from Temperate Grassland

Grasslands comprise a third of agricultural land world-wide, with “permanent” grasslands including diverse plant species whose complement and alternative success varies with their capabilities to resist the stresses they daily endure. From an agricultural perspective, Lolium spp. are considered an optimal choice as fodder for livestock, but they lack the resilience to combat severe abiotic stresses observed in their close relatives, the Festuca spp.. These number around 500 species and together are dispersed widely with adaptations to most climatic and edaphic extremes. Natural Festulolium hybrids exist usually with an adaptive gain relative to their parents, a consequence of interactions between their constituent genomes, but equivalent synthetic Festulolium species’ hybrid combinations are now also becoming increasingly commercially available, either in amphiploid or introgressive forms combining the positive attributes of the parent species’ including resilience to stress conditions. The extreme genetic variation for adaptive traits present in the Lolium-Festuca genome complex provides access to novel alleles for use in crop improvement, and also opportunities to improve understanding how these adaptations have evolved and operate, which will benefit related crop species. These include species such as rice, wheat, and barley which share common ancestors with Lolium and Festuca species, and as a consequence retain extensive genome synteny.

Permanent grasslands are more than agricultural crops; they provide significant environmental service through their capabilities at acquiring and regulating the release of C, nutrient and water. Their continuity is essential as they have a major role in mitigating the worst scenarios of climate change.