The grain‐filling stage in Triticum aestivum (wheat) is highly vulnerable to increasing temperature as terminal heat stress diminishes grain quality and yield. To examine the mechanism of terminal heat tolerance, we performed the biochemical and gene expression analyses using two heat‐tolerant (WH730 and WH1218) and two heat‐sensitive (WH711 and WH157) wheat genotypes. We observed a significant increase in total soluble sugar (25%–47%), proline (7%–15%), and glycine betaine (GB) (22%–34%) contents in flag leaf, whereas a decrease in grain‐filling duration, 1000‐kernel weight (8%–25%), and grain yield per plant (11%–23%) was observed under the late‐sown compared to the timely sown. The maximum content of osmolytes, including total soluble sugar, proline, and GB, was observed in heat‐tolerant genotypes compared to heat‐sensitive genotypes. The expression of 10 heat‐responsive genes associated with heat shock proteins ( sHsp‐1 , Hsp17 , and HsfA4 ), flavonoid biosynthesis ( F3′‐1 and PAL ), β‐glucan synthesis ( CslF6 and CslH ), and xyloglucan metabolism ( XTH1 , XTH2 , and XTH5 ) was studied in flag leaf exposed to different heat treatments (34, 36, 38, and 40°C) at 15 days after anthesis by quantitative real‐time polymerase chain reaction. A significant increase in the relative fold expression of these genes with increasing temperature indicated their involvement in providing heat‐stress tolerance. The high differential expression of most of the genes in heat‐tolerant genotype “WH730” followed by “WH1218” indicates the high adaptability of these genotypes to heat stress compared to heat‐sensitive wheat genotypes. Based on the previous results, “WH730” performed better in terms of maximum osmolyte accumulation, grain yield, and gene expression under heat stress.

In wheat, lodging is affected by anatomical and chemical characteristics of the stem cell wall. Plant characteristics determining the stem strength were measured in lodging tolerant mutant (PMW-2016-1) developed through mutation breeding utilizing hexaploid wheat cultivar, DPW-621-50. Various anatomical features, chemical composition, and mechanical strength of the culms of newly developed lodging-tolerant mutant (PMW-2016-1) and parent (DPW-621-50), were examined by light microscopy, the Klason method, prostate tester coupled with a Universal Tensile Machine, and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy. Significant changes in the anatomical features, including the outer radius of the stem, stem wall thickness, and the proportions of various tissues, and vascular bundles were noticed. Chemical analysis revealed that the lignin level in the PMW-2016-1 mutant was higher and exhibited superiority in stem strength compared to the DPW-621-50 parent line. The force (N) required to break the internodes of mutant PMW-2016-1 was higher than that of DPW-621-50. The results suggested that the outer stem radius, stem wall thickness, the proportion of sclerenchyma tissues, the number of large vascular bundles, and lignin content are important factors that affect the mechanical strength of wheat stems, which can be the key parameters for the selection of varieties having higher lodging tolerance. Preliminary studies on the newly identified mutant PMW-2016-1 suggested that this mutant may possess higher lodging tolerance because it has a higher stem strength than DPW-621-50 and can be used as a donor parent for the development of lodging-tolerant wheat varieties.

Medicinal plants are the main natural pools for the primary health care system, ethno-medicine, as well as traditional Indian system of several medicines. Uttarakhand also known as ‘Herbal State’, is a rich source of medicinal plants and traditional medicinal knowledge. A great deal of information about medicinal plants of Uttarakhand is scattered in different forms. Although many medicinal plant databases are available, currently there is no cohesive manually curated database of medicinal plants widely distributed in Uttarakhand state. A comprehensive database has been developed, known as the Uttarakhand Medicinal Plants Database (UMPDB). UMPDB provides extensive information on botanical name, common name, taxonomy, genomic taxonomy id, habit, habitat, location in Uttarakhand, part use, medicinal use, genomic information (including number of nucleotides, proteins, ESTs), chemical information, and scientific literature. Annotated medicinal plants integrated in the current version of the database were collected from the existing books, databases, and available literature. The current version of UMPDB contains the 1127 records of medicinal plants which belong to 153 plant families distributed across 13 districts of Uttarakhand. The primary goal of developing this database is to provide traditional, genomic, and chemical descriptions of the medicinal plants exclusively found in various regions of Uttarakhand. We anticipate that embedded information in the database would help users to readily obtain desired information.