6 Combined Abiotic Stress in Legumes 139
under controlled environment conditions. Regardless of the screening method, a
key objective for plant breeders is to develop an effective set of stress combination
markers that can be used to improve legume crop species. Controlled environmental
conditions allow the dissection of each one of different stress effect and the identi-
fication of principal targets affecting plant tolerance. Breeding for stress tolerance
requires efficient screening procedures, identification of key traits in diverse donor
or tolerant lines and understanding their inheritance and molecular genetics. Statis-
tical package applied to plant breeding will facilitate the identification of markers
in a multi-trait multi-environment way (Malosetti et al. 2004 ).
Several quantitative trait locus (QTL) studies relating to various abiotic stress
tolerances have already been reported showing it is possible to improve and ac-
celerate the breeding process in plant species without sequenced genomes (Chan-
dra et al. 2004 ). In order to transfer these traits, classical breeding requires the
establishment of rapid and cost-effective screening procedures and implementing
these using breeding approaches such as association mapping or genomic selection
procedures.
For the complete sequencing of the different important legumes, genome
opens the possibility of fine mapping of the QTLs. In this perspective, gene
identification for combined stress tolerance in legumes using genetic map
information and genome data is an achievable goal (Heffner et al. 2009 ; Hirayama
and Shinozaki 2010 ).
Phenotypic and physiological characterization along with RNA sequencing anal-
ysis of plants subjected to drought, heat, salt, flooding stress or their combination
would confirm that the simultaneous imposition of different types of stress pres-
ents unique but varied aspects that includes alteration of respiration rate, decreased
photosynthesis, stomatal closure, high leaf temperature and redox homeostasis.
Thus, deep phenotyping methodologies, genome-based selection and massive RNA
sequencing technologies emerge as a promising avenue for the development of mul-
tiple abiotic stress-tolerant crops.
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