Pollination Biology

A special issue of Biology (ISSN 2079-7737). This special issue belongs to the section "Ecology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2025 | Viewed by 1162

Special Issue Editor

College of Plant Protection, Jilin Agricultural University, Changchun 130118, China
Interests: pest control; agricultural entomology; insect ecology; plant-based pesticide
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear colleagues,

As an important part of the ecosystem, pollinating insects provide important ecological services to the ecosystem and also play an important role in maintaining the dynamic balance and relative stability of the ecosystem. Pollinators have important links to ecosystem health, green agriculture, food security and nutritional health. Pollinator insects account for 80–85% of all animal pollination and provide vital services to the plant–pollinator ecosystem, the importance of which is widely recognized by researchers and the general public. Honeybees are the dominant pollinating insects, with some 17,000 species and 90 percent of the world's 107 major crop species pollinated by bees. Since the 1960s, the area of crops dependent on insect pollination has tripled worldwide, and the direct or indirect economic value of insect pollination services has become an important component of gross agricultural product in many developed countries. This Special Issue will cover a wide range of topics relating to pollinator insects and their applications in agriculture. We encourage researchers and experts from different disciplines to contribute their valuable insights and findings to this Special Issue. We welcome both original research and review articles on the following topics, including, but not limited to:

(1) Pollinator insect diversity;

(2) Pollinator–plant interactions;

(3) Conservation and utilization of pollinators;

(4) Environmental effects on pollinators;

(5) Applications of pollinator insects in agriculture.

Dr. Yu Gao
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • conservation biology

  • insect diversity
  • pollinator-plant interactions
  • ecosystem service

  • pollinator insect

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

15 pages, 2328 KiB  
Article
Identification, Elucidation and Deployment of a Cytoplasmic Male Sterility System for Hybrid Potato
by Ernst-Jan Eggers, Ying Su, Esmee van der Poel, Martijn Flipsen, Michiel E. de Vries, Christian W. B. Bachem, Richard G. F. Visser and Pim Lindhout
Biology 2024, 13(6), 447; https://doi.org/10.3390/biology13060447 - 18 Jun 2024
Viewed by 825
Abstract
Recent advances in diploid F1 hybrid potato breeding rely on the production of inbred lines using the S-locus inhibitor (Sli) gene. As a result of this method, female parent lines are self-fertile and require emasculation before hybrid seed production. The [...] Read more.
Recent advances in diploid F1 hybrid potato breeding rely on the production of inbred lines using the S-locus inhibitor (Sli) gene. As a result of this method, female parent lines are self-fertile and require emasculation before hybrid seed production. The resulting F1 hybrids are self-fertile as well and produce many undesirable berries in the field. Utilization of cytoplasmic male sterility would eliminate the need for emasculation, resulting in more efficient hybrid seed production and male sterile F1 hybrids. We observed plants that completely lacked anthers in an F2 population derived from an interspecific cross between diploid S. tuberosum and S. microdontum. We studied the antherless trait to determine its suitability for use in hybrid potato breeding. We mapped the causal locus to the short arm of Chromosome 6, developed KASP markers for the antherless (al) locus and introduced it into lines with T and A cytoplasm. We found that antherless type male sterility is not expressed in T and A cytoplasm, proving that it is a form of CMS. We hybridized male sterile al/al plants with P cytoplasm with pollen from al/al plants with T and A cytoplasm and we show that the resulting hybrids set significantly fewer berries in the field. Here, we show that the antherless CMS system can be readily deployed in diploid F1 hybrid potato breeding to improve hybridization efficiency and reduce berry set in the field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Pollination Biology)
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