Aspects in oat breeding: nutrition quality, nakedness and disease resistance, challenges and perspectives

Abstract

Traditionally, the oat crop (Avena sativa) has been neglected in a number of respects, cultivated in cropping areas not optimal for wheat, barley or maize. In recent years the interest in oats has increased, particularly because of its dietary benefits and therapeutic potential for human health. The uniqueness and advantages of naked oats over other popular cereals, due to its potentially valuable nutritional composition, have been well studied and reported, opening new market “niches” for oats. Despite the well‐documented benefits, the status of the oat crop is still fragile, due to many reasons. The area cultivated for the oat crop is much less compared with other cereals, and therefore commercial efforts in oat breeding are less. Oat groat yield is lower than other cereals such as wheat and the nutritious uniqueness has not been reflected in agreeable market prices. The same price still exists for both naked and conventional/covered oats in the world grain market. The absence of visible market competitiveness, and some of the oat biological drawbacks, including low grain yield, keeps the oat crop as a lower profitability minor crop. This review is intended to analyse and summarise main achievements and challenges in oat genetics, agronomy and phytopathology to find possible ways of oat improvement and future perspectives for oat breeding.

Diversity and Pre-Breeding Prospects for Local Adaptation in Oat Genetic Resources

“…The selection gain for grain weight could be attributed to the correlated selection response for grain yield, whereas grading appeared as an important selection criterion as most of the naked oats were discarded. For naked oats less breeding effort has been undertaken, resulting in a comparable low number of released varieties [59,60]. Therefore, this type has only regionally a niche market [57,59].…”

“…For naked oats less breeding effort has been undertaken, resulting in a comparable low number of released varieties [59,60]. Therefore, this type has only regionally a niche market [57,59]. All black oats were discarded as well, as there is generally no market for this germplasm in Estonia or the Czech Republic, where the accessions were tested.…”

Current Knowledge of Content and Composition of Oat Oil—Future Perspectives of Oat as Oil Source

“…In the past, oats were mainly treated as a phytosanitary plant or planted for horse feeding purposes (Gorash et al 2017). Currently, oat grain is increasingly used in the food industry due to its rising use in exclusion diets, e.g.…”

“…Currently, oat varieties with different chemical composition are used in oat cultivation (Gorash et al 2017). Research is also being conducted on the improvement of quality and increase in yield of varieties containing bioactive compounds (Kawka and Achremowicz 2014).…”

Evapotranspiration, Grain Yield, and Water Productivity of Spring Oat (Avena sativa L.) under Semiarid Climate

“…Consequently, oat production is decreasing despite the crop has great nutritional and therapeutic values. Gorash et al [8] reported that oat crop traditionally has been neglected in a number of respects, cultivated in non-optimal cropping areas as wheat, barley or maize. Lin et al [9] reported oat actual evapotranspiration (ETc) range of 227 -305 mm and water productivity that varied from 1.03 to 1.2 kg/m 3 under conventional irrigation and alternative partial root zone irrigation in Baicheng city, Jilin province of China.…”