This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: A University of Queensland study has outlined a practical pathway for accelerating the development of heat-adapted chickpeas using data from new 'omic' technologies. Ph.D. candidate Callum Jamie said the suite of technologies offered tremendous opportunities to understand how a complex trait like heat tolerance works.
The work is published in the journal Food and Energy Security. "The narrow genetic diversity in the elite chickpea gene pool has limited conventional breeding's effectiveness for stress tolerance," Jamie said. "These technologies have improved our capacity to dissect trait architecture and phenotype secondary traits, but their use in chickpeas has been limited." They include genomics, epigenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, phenomics and enviromics, and help provide a comprehensive picture of biological systems.
For example, epigenomics helps researchers understand what controls gene activity; transcriptomics considers gene expression; proteomics examines protein production; metabolomics looks at biochemical processes; phenomics observes traits; and enviromics considers environmental factors influencing outcomes. "Studies have focused on one to two -omic datasets, a small number of genotypes, and single tissues, which means it is harder to infer what results mean for trait architecture and mechanisms. "Our ability to extrapolate the information to breeding populations is also limited." There have also been challenges around cost, scalability and integrating very different types of data to make the technologies useful.
To overcome the hurdles, Jamie's research at the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation has resulted in a proposed staged approach. It would start with genomic prediction and phenotyping, before adding -omic layers as costs fall and unknowns are resolved. "These technologies are novel and we still don't know which information provides added value and how best to integrate all of this data to achieve an outcome," Jamie said.
His Ph.D. is aligned to a project which aims to fast-track the development of chickpea varieties adapted to high temperatures. Millicent Smith said heat stress causes severe yield implications through flower and pod loss, reduced pollen viability and impaired grain filling. "Late-sown chickpea is particularly in the firing line across most of Australia's crop in southern Queensland and northern New South Wales," Smith said.
"We want to ensure that Australian growers maintain their competitive edge. "New varieties with improved genetics to cope with heat stress are essential for the future. "This work, suggesting a staged approach to utilizing the new -omic technologies, is an exciting frontier." Callum Jamie et al., The Multi‐Omics Opportunity to Improve Heat Adaptation in Chickpea, Food and Energy Security (2026).
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