Domesticated in 8000–10,000 BP in northern China, proso millet (Panicum miliaceum L.) is the best adaptive rotational crop for semiarid central High Plains of the USA, where average annual precipitation is 356–407 mm. Proso millet has multiple benefits when consumed as human food. Proso millet is rich in minerals, dietary fiber, polyphenols, vitamins and proteins. It is gluten-free and therefore, ideal for the gluten intolerant people. Proso millet contains high lecithin which supports the neural health system. It is rich in vitamins (niacin, B-complex vitamins, folic acid), minerals (P, Ca, Zn, Fe) and essential amino acids (methionine and cysteine). It has a low glycemic index and reduces the risk of type-2 diabetes. Unfortunately, in the USA, it is mostly considered as bird feed, whereas it is mainly used as human food in many other countries. Besides human health benefits, proso millet has an impeccable environmental benefit. Proso millet possesses many unique characteristics (e.g., drought tolerance, short-growing season) which makes it a promising rotational crop for winter wheat-based dryland farming systems. Proso millet provides the most economical production system when used in a two years wheat/summer fallow cropping system in semiarid High Plains of the USA. It helps in controlling winter annual grass weeds, managing disease and insect pressure and preserving deep soil moisture for wheat. Proso millet can also be used as a rotational crop with corn or sorghum owing to its tolerance for atrazine, the primary herbicide used in corn and sorghum production systems. Proso millet certainly is a climate-smart, gluten-free, ancient, and small grain cereal, which is healthy to humans and the environment. The main challenge is to expand the proso millet market beyond bird feed into the human food industry. To overcome the challenge, unique proso millet varieties for human food and ready-to-use multiple food products must be developed. This requires successful collaboration among experts from diverse disciplines such as breeders, geneticists, food chemists and food industry partners.

Our long-term goal is to develop wheat cultivars that will improve the profitability and competitiveness of organic producers in Nebraska and the Northern Great Plains. Our approach is to select in early generations for highly heritable traits that are needed for both organic and conventional production (another breeding goal), followed by a targeted organic breeding effort with testing at two organic locations (each in a different ecological region) beginning with the F₆ generation. Yield analyses from replicated trials at two organic breeding sites and 7 conventional breeding sites from F₆ through F₁₂ nurseries revealed, using analyses of variance, biplots, and comparisons of selected lines that it is inappropriate to use data from conventional testing for making germplasm selections for organic production. Selecting and testing lines under organic production practices in different ecological regions was also needed and cultivar selections for organic production were different than those for conventional production. Modifications to this breeding protocol may include growing early generation bulks in an organic cropping system. In the future, our selection efforts should also focus on using state-of-the-art, non-transgenic breeding technologies (genomic selection, marker-assisted breeding, and high throughput phenotyping) to synergistically improve organic and conventional wheat breeding.

Low grain protein in hard red winter (HRW) wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is a serious challenge for rainfed wheat growers, particularly in years with elevated grain yield. Proper nitrogen (N) management with adequate N rate and application timing is critical for optimizing grain yield and protein content. This 2‐yr experiment evaluated the effects of different N rates and application timings (fall, spring, and split) on grain yield and protein of two HRW wheat cultivars. Field studies were conducted at four different sites across Nebraska under rainfed conditions in 2018/2019 (Year 1) and 2019/2020 (Year 2). A split‐plot randomized complete block design with wheat cultivars as the whole plots and factorial combinations of six N rates and three application timings as the subplots was used in four replications. Grain yield was associated positively and grain protein negatively with the water supply to demand ratio (WS/WD) in the season. Freeman cultivar yielded better in a year with higher WS/WD and a newly developed cultivar, Ruth, yielded better in a lower WS/WD year. Nitrogen fertilization significantly increased grain yield in the site‐years with moderately higher WS/WD. There was an increase in grain protein with increasing N rates at all site‐years. Spring and split‐applied N resulted in better grain yield than fall application in the site‐year when there was a risk of N loss. This experiment suggested that an effective N management strategy for winter wheat should account for and be adaptable to weather variability to optimize grain yield and protein content.