Rice Genomics and Genetics 2015, Vol.6, No.9, 1-9
1
Research Article Open Access
Augmentation of Mineral and Protein Content in Rice (
Oryza sativa
L.)
Brar B. , Jain S., Jain R.K.
Department of Molecular Biology, Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, College of Basic Sciences and Humanities, CCS Haryana Agricultural University,Hisar,
125004, India
Corresponding author email
Rice Genomics and Genetics, 2015, Vol.6, No.9 doi: 9 .5376/rgg.2015.06.00009
Received: 08 Sep., 2015
Accepted: 13 Oct., 2015
Published: 20 Oct., 2015
Copyright
©
2015
Brar et al., This is an open access article published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use,
distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Preferred citation for this article:
Brar B., Jain S. and Jain R.K., 2015, Augmentation of Mineral and Protein Content in Rice (
Oryza sativa
L.), Rice Genomics and Genetics, Vol.6, No.9 1
-
9
(doi
Abstract
Rice (
Oryza sativa
L.) is the major source of food for more than half of the world’s population. As a model cereal crop,
the complete genome sequences of rice has become fundamental tool for study gene functions and correlate it with the practical
applications in plants. At present, rice researchers devote much effort to generating mineral rich rice genotypes to combact the
micronutrient malnutrition. Such processes combine different techniques such as mineral content analysis for the available rice
gemplasm, genetic transformation, molecular analysis, molecular breeding etc. Here, we briefly review the progress in
biofortification of rice with micronutrient elements (Fe, Zn, and Vitamin A) and discuss the various aspects such as:- Rice and
genetic diversity for mineral content, micronutrient malnutrition the hidden-hunger, biofortification, molecular and transgenic
strategies for improving iron, zinc content, protein quality in rice.
Keywords
Biofortification; Iron; Micronutrient malnutrition; Rice and zinc
Introduction
More than half of the world’s population, especially
women and children in the developing countries,
suffer from micronutrient malnutrition or ‘hidden
hunger’ resulting from the consumption of meager
bioavailable vitamins and minerals containing diets
(UN SCN, 2004). Micronutrient malnutrition is the
condition that develops when the body does not get
the optimum amount of the vitamins, minerals and
other micronutrients which are essential to maintain
metabolic regulation and organ function. Among the
major nutritional problems common in developing
countries are: micronutrient (iron, zinc, vitamin A)
and protein-energy malnutrition (Bouis et al., 2003).
It is estimated that over 800 million people go to bed
hungry everyday and approximately 3 billion people
are suffering from micronutrient deficiency.
Micronutrient malnutrition causes several diseases;
the affected people are more prone to infection to
other diseases resulting in further deterioration in
quality of life.
Rice, the world’s most important food crop that
feeds over half of the global population, is a model
plant species for genomic research. Over the past
few decades till 1990, most of the breeding research
was concentrated on increasing the grain yield and
to improve the resistance to environmental stresses,
pests and pathogens (Borlaug, 2000), but little or no
attention was given towards the enhancement of its
nutritional quality. In1996, the International Rice
Research Institute (IRRI) released the first high
yielding rice variety ‘IR8’. In the subsequent decade,
a small number of such high yielding varieties
almost completely replaced the thousands of the
traditional rice landraces previously cultivated by
the farmers. This resulted in the immense ‘genetic
erosion’ and loss of biodiversity. Despite the loss, a
lot of germplasm still exists and being maintained by
the international such as International Rice Research
Institute (IRRI, The Philippines) and national
research institutions in various countries. Most of
this germplasm is yet to be tested for the nutritional
quality traits. Several groups have examined the
feasibility of “Biofortification” approach for
improving the micronutrient content of staple crops
and found that: (i) substantial useful genetic
variation exists in key staple crops (ii) breeding
programs can readily manage nutritional quality
traits, which have been reported to be highly
heritable in some crops and desired traits are
