Summary

Hidden hunger induced by micronutrient deficiencies and exposure to heavy metal are significant health challenges of the human at present. As such, United Nations (UN) declared that tackling micronutrient deficiencies is one of the sustainable development goals to be achieved by 2035. Being staple crop, nutritional quality of rice plays a key role in the life quality of its consumers. Rice is an accumulator of many minerals including Fe, Zn, Se, As, Cd. Rice is recognized as one of the major pathways through which biofortification of micronutrients such Fe, Zn, Se and bioaccumulation of heavy metal occur. No systematic study with long term plan has been done on the vastly diverse Sri Lankan rice cultivars on these aspects. This proposed research envisages to identify Sri Lankan rice cultivars that accumulate varying amounts of metal ions in the seeds. By deploying genotyped pure lines of 212 Sri Lankan rice cultivars for the first time, this research project plans to identify gens and parents for improving rice with higher accumulation of micronutrients while reducing heavy metals in the seeds. In addition, basis for discovering genes for making ‘healthy rice’ is provided through this project. Biofortification is the most affordable and sustainable solution for the hidden hunger among rice consumers who are from resource poor backgrounds. Outcome of this research will have significant impact on improving nutritional quality and food safety of rice in Sri Lanka and can be extended to global scale. Moreover, trans-national collaboration established with RRDISL+ and other research Universities* will facilitate the effective sharing of knowledge, skills and resources to enrich rice research in Sri Lanka.

Objectives

1)    Determination of patterns of metal (Fe, Zn, Co, Mn, Pb, Al, As, Cd ) accumulation in the grain of 212 Sri Lankan rice varieties with known genomic identity (established in IRRI)

2)    Carry out genome wide association study (GWAS) using the 6K short nucleotide polymorphic (SNP) data on these 212 varieties to identify the prospective polymorphic genomic regions.

3)    Identification of promising genomic areas associated with inclusion/ exclusion of metal ions through comprehensive bioinformatics analysis 4)    Make available data for designing rice improvement programmes for nutritional quality  5)    Initiate functional validation of promising candidate genes through near isogenic lines (NIL) or allele association studies.

Major Equipment Facilitated by Grant

N/A