Germplasm evaluation for crop improvement: Analysis of grain quality and cadmium accumulation in barley

Identification of heavy metal pollutants in wheat by THz spectroscopy and deep support vector machine

This paper proposes to detect heavy metal pollutants in wheat using terahertz spectroscopy and deep support vector machine (DSVM). Five heavy metal pollutants, arsenic, lead, mercury, chromium, and cadmium, were considered for detection in wheat samples. THz spectral data were pre-processed by wavelet denoising. DSVM was introduced to further enhance the accuracy of the SVM classification model. According to the relationship between the accuracy and the training time with the number of hidden layers ranging from 1 to 4, the model performs the best when the hidden layer network has three layers. Besides, using the back-propagation algorithm to optimize the entire DSVM network. Compared with Deep neural network (DNN) and SVM models, the comprehensive evaluation index of the proposed model optimized by DSVM has the highest accuracy of 91.3 %. It realized the exploration enhanced the classification accuracy of the heavy metal pollutants in wheat.

A crucial role for a node-localized transporter, HvSPDT, in loading phosphorus into barley grains

Grains are the major sink of phosphorus (P) in cereal crops, accounting for 60-85% of total plant P, but the mechanisms underlying P loading into the grains are poorly understood. We functionally characterized a transporter gene required for the distribution of P to the grains in barley (Hordeum vulgare), HvSPDT (SULTR-like phosphorus distribution transporter). HvSPDT encoded a plasma membrane-localized Pi/H⁺ cotransporter. It was mainly expressed in the nodes at both the vegetative and reproductive stages. Furthermore, its expression was induced by inorganic phosphate (Pi) deficiency. In the nodes, HvSPDT was expressed in both the xylem and phloem region of enlarged and diffuse vascular bundles. Knockout of HvSPDT decreased the distribution of P to new leaves, but increased the distribution to old leaves at the vegetative growth stage under low P supply. However, knockout of HvSPDT did not alter the redistribution of P from old to young organs. At the reproductive stage, knockout of HvSPDT significantly decreased P allocation to the grains, resulting in a considerable reduction in grain yield, especially under P-limited conditions. Our results indicate that node-based HvSPDT plays a crucial role in loading P into barley grains through preferentially distributing P from the xylem and further to the phloem.