ARS/NET Economic Botany & Plant Genetic Resources syllabus

Unit 1: Plant Taxonomy and Biosystematics

Nomenclature, purpose, principles and systems of classification; taxonomy of higher plants, floras, manuals, monographs, indexes, catalogues and dictionaries, herbaria. Concepts of biosystematics, evolution and differentiation of species. Biosystematics and taxonomic tools. Origin, evolution and biosystematics of selected crops including rice, wheat, rapeseed & mustard, cotton. Molecular systematics, global taxonomic initiatives, barcoding and databases.

Unit 2: Economically Important Plants - I

Origin, history, domestication, botany, genetic resource activities, cultivation, production and uses of cereals such as wheat, rice, maize, sorghum, pearl millet and minor millets. Pulses including pigeon pea, chickpea, black gram, green gram, cowpea, soybean, pea, lentil, horsegram, lab-lab bean, ricebean, winged bean, French bean, lima bean, sword bean. Oilseeds such as groundnut, sesame, castor, rapeseed, mustard, sunflower, safflower, Niger, oil palm, coconut and linseed. Structure, development and chemical constituents of plant parts. Revival of under-utilized crops and their economic benefits.

Unit 3: Economically Important Plants - II

Origin, distribution, cultivation, production and utilization of economic plants including fibres like cotton, silk cotton, jute, sun hemp, agave, flax and mesta (kenaf). Sugars such as sugarcane, sugar beet, sugar palm and sweet sorghum. Fodders and green manure crops. Plantation crops including coconut, cocoa, tea. Root and tuber crops such as potato, sweet potato, tapioca, aroids etc.

Unit 4: Economically Important Plants - III

Origin, distribution, classification, production and utilization of fruits including mango, banana, citrus, guava, grapes and other indigenous fruits; apple, plum, pear, peach, cashew nut and walnut. Vegetables including tomato, brinjal, okra, cucumber, cole crops, gourds etc. Fumigatories and masticatories: tobacco, betelvine, arecanut. Medicinal and aromatic plants like sarpagandha, belladonna, cinchona, nux-vomica, vinca, mentha, glycyrrhiza, plantago etc. Narcotics: cannabis, datura, gloriosa, pyrethrum and opium. Dye-, tannin-, gum- and resin-yielding plants. Plants of agroforestry importance including multipurpose trees/shrubs like subabool, Acacia nilotica, poplar, sesbania, neem etc. Non-traditional economic plants: jojoba, guayule, jatropha, carcus etc.

Unit 5: Biodiversity and Plant Genetic Resources (PGR)

Biosphere and biodiversity; plant species richness and endemism; concept and importance of plant genetic resources and their increasing erosion. Centres of origin and diversity of crop plants, domestication, evaluation and bioprospecting. National and international organizations associated with PGR. Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Recent issues related to access and ownership of PGR, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Plant Breeders' Rights (PBRs), farmers' rights, sui-generis system etc. Agrobiodiversity, habitat fragmentation, ecology concepts, legal issues related to endangered species and protection. Conservation genetics, reproductive fitness. Global plan of action, National Biodiversity Authority (NBA), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Agreement on Agriculture, Delhi declaration, International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV), Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act (PPV&FRA), and Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Agreement.

Unit 6: Germplasm Augmentation

History and importance of germplasm collection, eco-geographical distribution of diversity, logistics of exploration and collection. Use of flora and herbaria, random and selective sampling, gene pool sampling in self- and cross-pollinated species. Concept, importance and eco-geographical considerations of introduction and exchange of plant germplasm. Prerequisites, conventions and achievements of PGR exchange. Multilateral agreements, Material Transfer Agreements (MTAs), national and international legislations, geospatial analysis, remote sensing, FAO code of conduct, taxonomic databases and documentation systems.

Unit 7: Germplasm Conservation

Principles and methods of conservation including in situ and ex situ methods, on-farm conservation. Gene banks: short-, medium- and long-term conservation strategies. Seed physiology and seed technology in conservation. Seed storage behavior (orthodox, recalcitrant), field gene banks, clonal repositories. Gene bank management and standards for various crops. ISTA, AOSA, IPGRI guidelines and documentation of information in gene banks. Cryopreservation strategies, monitoring genetic stability. Global and national gene bank status. Strategies for revival and rescue of rare genetic material. National action plan for agrobiodiversity. Formal and informal seed systems. On-farm conservation.

Unit 8: Biotechnology in PGR

Plant conservation biotechnology. Biotechnology in plant germplasm acquisition. Plant tissue culture in disease elimination, in vitro conservation and exchange. Cryopreservation, transgenics exchange and biosafety issues. Biochemical and molecular approaches to assessing plant diversity. DNA fingerprinting, Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) tools, Genome-Wide Association Studies (GWAS), bioinformatics tools to analyze molecular data.

Unit 9: Plant Quarantine

Principles, objectives and relevance of plant quarantine. Regulations and plant quarantine setup in India. Economic significance of seed-borne pests, pathogens and weeds. Detection and post-entry quarantine operations. Salvaging of infested/infected germplasm. Domestic quarantine.

Unit 10: Germplasm Characterization, Evaluation, Maintenance and Regeneration

Principles and strategies of PGR evaluation. Approaches in germplasm characterization and diversity analysis. Concept of core collection. Descriptors and descriptor states for data scoring. Maintenance of working and active collections of self-, cross-pollinated and vegetatively propagated crops, perennials and wild relatives. Principles and practices of regeneration in relation to mode of reproduction. Concepts of genetic integrity, genetic shift, genetic drift and optimum environment. Post-harvest handling of germplasm. PGR database management. Statistical designs and analysis. Evaluation for specific traits like biotic and abiotic stress tolerance, nutritional traits, high throughput phenotyping, reference collection, genetic enhancement.