Global agricultural productivity and food security are threatened by climate change, the growing world population, and the difficulties posed by the pandemic era. To overcome these challenges and meet food requirements, breeders have applied and implemented different advanced techniques that accelerate plant development and increase crop selection effectiveness. However, only two or three generations could be advanced annually using these approaches. Speed breeding (SB) is an innovative and promising technology to develop new varieties in a shorter time, utilizing the manipulation of controlled environmental conditions. This strategy can reduce the generation length from 2.5 to 5 times compared to traditional methods and accelerate generation advancement and crop improvement, accommodating multiple generations of crops per year. Beside long breeding cycles, SB can address other challenges related to traditional breeding, such as response to environmental conditions, disease and pest management, genetic uniformity, and improving resource efficiency. Combining genomic approaches such as marker-assisted selection, genomic selection, and genome editing with SB offers the capacity to further enhance breeding efficiency by reducing breeding cycle time, enabling early phenotypic assessment, efficient resource utilization, and increasing selection accuracy and genetic gain per year. Genomics-assisted SB holds the potential to revolutionize plant breeding by significantly accelerating the identification and selection of desirable genetic traits, expediting the development of improved crop varieties crucial for addressing global agricultural challenges.

Phenotypic and genotypic characterization were performed to assess heritability, variability, and seed yield stability of pea genotypes used in breeding to increase the pea production area. A European pea diversity panel, including genotypes from North America, Asia, and Australia consisting of varieties, breeding lines, pea, and landraces was examined in 2019 and 2020 in Serbia and Belgium using augmented block design. The highest heritability was for thousand seed weight; the highest coefficient of variation was for seed yield. The highest positive correlation was between number of seeds per plant and number of pods per plant; the highest negative correlation was between seed yield and protein content. Hierarchical clustering separated pea germplasm based on use and type. Different Principal component analysis grouping of landraces, breeding lines, and varieties, as well as forage types and garden and dry peas, confirms that there was an apparent decrease in similarity between the genotypes, which can be explained by their different purposes. Pea breeding should be focused on traits with consistent heritability and a positive effect on seed yield when selecting high-yielding genotypes, and on allowing for more widespread use of pea in various agricultural production systems.

Soybean time of flowering and maturity are genetically controlled by E genes. Different allelic combinations of these genes determine soybean adaptation to a specific latitude. The paper describes the first attempt to assess adaptation of soybean genotypes developed and realized at Institute of Field and Vegetable Crops, Novi Sad, Serbia [Novi Sad (NS) varieties and breeding lines] based on E gene variation, as well as to comparatively assess E gene variation in North-American (NA), Chinese, and European genotypes, as most of the studies published so far deal with North-American and Chinese cultivars and breeding material. Allelic variation and distribution of the major maturity genes (E1, E2, E3, and E4) has been determined in 445 genotypes from soybean collections of NA ancestral lines, Chinese germplasm, and European varieties, as well as NS varieties and breeding lines. The study showed that allelic combinations of E1–E4 genes significantly determined the adaptation of varieties to different geographical regions, although they have different impacts on maturity. In general, each collection had one major E genotype haplogroup, comprising over 50% of the lines. The exceptions were European varieties that had two predominant haplogroups and NA ancestral lines distributed almost evenly among several haplogroups. As e1-as/e2/E3/E4 was the most common genotype in NS population, present in the best-performing genotypes in terms of yield, this specific allele combination was proposed as the optimal combination for the environments of Central-Eastern Europe.

Seed decay is one of the most important diseases of soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) that has a negative impact on the market grade of soybeans. The disease is mainly caused by Diaporthe longicolla, along with other Diaporthe species. Screening of soybean seeds health status in Vojvodina Province, Serbia, showed cultural and morphological variability among isolates identified as D. longicolla. With the use of DNA sequences of internal transcribed spacer (ITS1-5.8S-ITS2) region and partial translation elongation factor 1-alpha (EF1-α), the new species was determined. BLAST analysis showed 100% identity with D. pseudolongicolla (syn. D. novem) that was described in this study and its taxonomic revision is discussed. Pathogenicity trial showed that both species, D. longicolla and D. pseudolongicolla, are highly pathogenic on soybean stem and seed, causing 100% of stem wilting and more than 82% of seed decay.