Fusarium head blight is a worldwide disease caused by Fusarium graminea, which seriously affects the yield and quality of wheat. The toxin of deoxynivetol (DON) produced by the grain infected by the pathogen poses a serious threat to human and animal health. In wheat, the toxicity of DON toxin is mainly caused by oxidative stress, and the main function of vitamin E in plants is antioxidant. In order to verify the effect of HGGT gene on reducing toxin accumulation in wheat grains, we developed the specific markers for HGGT gene and screened 23 varieties carrying HGGT gene from 133 national dominant varieties and some local varieties and lines. Combined with the data of two-year average diseased spikelet rate and grain DON toxin content, the correlation analysis showed that: the average diseased spikelet rate with HGGT gene was 20.47%, which was 22.67 percentage points lower than that without HGGT gene (P<0.01), indicating that HGGT gene also had a certain effect on the spread resistance of wheat scab. Under the conditions of no inoculation, the average grain DON toxin content of cultivars carrying HGGT gene was 0.12 mg·kg^-1, which was 75.70% lower than that of cultivars without HGGT gene (P<0.05). Under inoculation conditions, the average grain DON toxin content of cultivars carrying HGGT gene was 5.51 mg·kg^-1, which was 52.97% lower than that of cultivars without HGGT gene (P<0.01). The difference of DON toxin content in grains after inoculation and before inoculation was correlated with genotype data, and it was found that there was a significant difference in the changes of toxin content in grains between varieties carrying HGGT gene and those without HGGT gene (P<0.01), and the DON toxin accumulation with this gene was reduced by 51.93%. It was verified that HGGT gene had a significantly negative regulatory effect on the accumulation of DON toxin in wheat grains. Yangmai 18, Yangmai 33, Sumai 3, harboring HGGT, had the lower grain DON toxin content than the national standard GB2761-2011 (1 000 μg·kg^-1) based on the phenotype of two years. This study could promote development of new wheat germplasm with low DON toxin.

NAC (NAM/ATAF/CUC) transcription factors are a large family of plant-specific transcription factors, consisting of highly conserved N-terminus and variable C-terminus. They are involved in a variety of biological processes and can regulate various plant traits. In this paper, the research progresses of NAC transcription factors in wheat in recent years were summarized, and their biological functions in wheat growth and environmental adaptation were systematically reviewed, mainly involving root growth, leaf senescence, grain development, and biotic and abiotic stress response. The result can enrich the regulatory network of NAC transcription factors, and provide theoretical basis for yield and quality improvement and molecular breeding in wheat.

In order to explore the feasibility of using GlutoPeak test (GPT) for rapid evaluation of wheat quality, flour samples of 150 wheat varieties (lines) were tested for the main quality indicators, including GPT indicators, sedimentation, gluten content, and dough rheological properties. The correlations between GPT indicators and other parameters were evaluated. The results showed that among the tested indicators of the wheat flour samples, water absorption had the smallest coefficient of variation (4.69%), while dough development time had the largest coefficient of variation (82.08%). The coefficients of variation for peak maximum time, startup energy, and plateau energy were all above 40%. Correlation analysis showed that there were significant correlations between the GPT indicators and dough rheological properties. The seven GPT indicators included peak maximum time (PMT), brabender units at the maximum (BEM), ante maximum (AM), post maximum (PM), startup energy (A1), plateau energy (A2) and aggregation energy (A3). The PMT showed a highly significant positive correlation with sedimentation and a highly significant negative correlation with wet gluten content, while the BEM, AM, PM and A3 exhibited a highly significant positive correlation with both sedimentation and wet gluten content. The AM, PM and A3 showed a highly significant positive correlation with water absorption and development time. The PMT had a highly significant negative correlation with water absorption, while it showed highly significant positive correlations with development time and stability time. The PMT, AM and PM were significantly positively correlated with stretch area and max resistance. Then, stepwise linear regression models were developed using the GPT indices to predict other parameters. The coefficients of determination were all significant at the 0.01 level, and the GPT indicators had high coefficients of determination (R²>0.6) for other parameters, such as stretch area, max resistance, gluten index, and stability time. A3 can predict sedimentation and wet gluten content, while PMT, AM and PM can predict stability time, stretch area, and gluten index among dough indicators.

To investigate the effects of nitrogen and phosphorus management during mid-late growth stages on starch and protein synthesis and accumulation in wheat grains, a study was conducted using the medium-strong gluten wheat cultivar Zhengmai 1860. Two single-factor completely randomized experiments were implemented across two locations (Kaifeng Longting and Zhoukou Dancheng) with consistent soil fertilization rates. Six nitrogen-phosphorus management treatments were established: CK (control): topdressing urea at jointing stage; Nt: twice topdressing urea at jointing and flowering stages; Nu: post-flowering spraying urea; P: post-flowering spraying K₂HPO₄; NtP: twice topdressing urea at jointing and flowering stages + post-flowering spraying K₂HPO₄; NuP: post-flowering spraying urea and K₂HPO₄. The study analyzed differences in grain soluble sugar content, starch synthase activity, starch content, amino acid content, nitrogen metabolism-related enzyme activity, protein content, dry matter accumulation at maturity, grain yield, and yield components under these treatments. The results showed that compared with CK, post-flowering urea or K₂HPO₄ spraying significantly increased grain soluble sugar content at both sites. Notably, the NuP treatment demonstrated a more substantial effect, registering an increase of 16.91 to 37.63 percentage points; Nt enhanced starch synthase activity only at Zhoukou Dancheng, while P significantly increased both bound and soluble starch synthase activities at both sites, with NuP exhibiting superior effects (18.34%—32.24% increase); Nt had no significant effect on starch content, but NtP significantly increased starch content at both sites. NuP improved starch content only at Kaifeng Longting; Nu increased amino acid content only at Zhoukou Dancheng, whereas NuP enhanced it significantly at both sites; NuP significantly boosted glutamine synthetase and glutamate synthase activities at both sites. Nt showed no effect on protein content, but NtP increased protein content at Zhoukou Dancheng, and the NuP treatment significantly increased the protein content in wheat grains at both experimental sites. During the maturity stage, the increase ranged from 3.35 to 3.68 percentage points; Both NtP and NuP significantly increased grain yield at both sites (8.12%—11.51%); In conclusion, combined treatments of twice topdressing urea at jointing and flowering stages with post-flowering K₂HPO₄ spraying (NtP) or post-flowering co-application of urea and K₂HPO₄ (NuP) effectively promoted starch and protein synthesis/accumulation and enhanced yield in wheat grains.

To explore the effects of amino acid chelated zinc on the yield and quality of wheat, Zhengmai 1860 was used as the experimental material. The treatments included spraying 0.2% and 0.4% concentrations of zinc sulfate, zinc aspartate, and zinc glycinate after anthesis, with spraying water as the blank control. The effects of zinc spraying on the yield and quality of wheat were studied. The results showed that spraying 0.2% zinc aspartate significantly increased the 1 000-grain weight of wheat at the two experimental sites of Longting, Kaifeng and Dancheng, Zhoukou by 6.17% and 6.58%, respectively; significantly increased the grain yield of wheat at the two sites by 5.05% and 5.32%, respectively; and significantly increased the bulk density of wheat at the two sites by 2.16% and 2.32%, respectively. Spraying zinc significantly reduced the degree of softening of wheat flour at the two sites by 16.06% to 26.98% and 12.21% to 34.27%, respectively. Spraying zinc aspartate significantly increased the wet gluten content of wheat flour at the two sites by 5.72% to 10.51% and 5.28% to 6.53%, respectively; significantly increased the maximum resistance of dough at the two sites by 17.27% to 20.96% and 12.25% to 14.13%, respectively; and significantly increased the sedimentation index of wheat flour at Longting, Kaifeng site by 19.69% to 28.14%. Spraying 0.2% zinc glycinate significantly increased the wet gluten content of wheat flour at the two sites by 6.27% and 7.40%, respectively; significantly increased the resistance at constant deformation of dough at the two sites by 18.37% and 8.21%, respectively; and significantly increased the dough development time and stability time of wheat flour at the Dancheng, Zhoukou site by 36.53% and 30.78%, respectively. In conclusion, spraying 0.2% zinc aspartate after anthesis can increase the 1 000-grain weight, grain yield and test weight of wheat, reduce the degree of softening of wheat flour, and increase the wet gluten content and tensile resistance of dough.

In order to investigate the effects of different nitrogen fertilizer application rates on the starch physicochemical properties and structure of wheat grain, and to analyse the reasons for the differences in the starch physicochemical properties, a strong-gluten variety Fengdecunmai 5 and a medium-gluten variety Bainong 207 were selected as the experimental materials, and set up four nitrogen application rates of 0, 180, 240, and 300 kg·hm^-2 noted as N0, N180, N240, N300 respectively. Starch physicochemical properties and structural characteristics under different nitrogen fertiliser application rates were determined. The results showed that with the increase of nitrogen application rate, the peak viscosity and swelling potential of the two varieties wheat were first rising and then falling, the peak temperature, enthalpy, content of branched starch B2 and B3 long chains, relative crystallinity, degree of surface ordering, number proportion of large starch granules all showed a trend of first declining and then rising. Fengdecunmai 5 and Bainong 207 all the extreme values were N240 and N180 treatment respectively. Compared with the N0 treatment, the N240 treatment of Fengdecunmai 5 and the N180 treatment of Bainong 207 showed an average increase in swelling potential of 36.74% and 7.23%, an average decrease in enthalpy of 18.94% and 27.43%, an average decrease in relative crystallinity of 16.29% and 9.82%, and an average decrease in the degree of order of the starch surface layer of 5.09% and 4.21%, respectively. In conclusion, the moderate application of nitrogen fertilizer can improve the starch physicochemical properties and structure of wheat grain.

To clarify the effects of one-time basal application of different types of controlled-release fertilizers on rice-stubble wheat, a field experiment was conducted using the wheat cultivar Huaimai 139. Four types of controlled-release fertilizer treatments were applied: vegetable oil-coated controlled-release compound fertilizer (A, N 26%), polyurethane-coated controlled-release compound fertilizer (B, N 32%), polyurethane-coated controlled-release nitrogen fertilizer (C, N 43%), and water-based resin-coated nitrogen fertilizer (D, N 43%). A treatment with split application of urea was used as control (CK, nitrogen applied at a basal to tillering to jointing to booting ratio of 5∶1∶2∶2), and a non-nitrogen treatment (N0) was set up caculate the nitrogen efficiency. The dry matter production, nitrogen accumulation, yield and economic benefits of rice-stubble wheat under different treatments were analyzed. The results showed that, compared with CK, A and B treatments significantly reduced nitrogen accumulation from jointing to heading and from heading to maturity, as well as nitrogen use efficiency. In A and B treatments, the number of spikes, grains per spike, and thousand-kernel weight were significantly decreased, leading to lower yield. C treatment significantly increased nitrogen accumulation at all key growth stages, enhanced photosynthetic capacity, nitrogen use efficiency, dry matter accumulation at maturity, thousand-kernel weight, yield, and net economic benefits. Yields in 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 increased by 3.89% and 5.35%, respectively, and the net benefit in 2022-2023 increased by 3.27%. D treatment showed no significant difference compared with CK in nitrogen accumulation patterns or yield, indicating stable performance. In conclusion, one-time basal application of polyurethane-coated nitrogen fertilizer can effectively meet nitrogen demand during mid-to-late growth stages, optimize yield formation, and improve both yield and economic efficiency.

To understand the effect of high-throughput non-destructive monitoring of wheat grain filling rate (GFR) based on UAV multi-spectral, 565 wheat germplasm accessions were used as experimental materials over two growing seasons (2022 and 2023). UAVs were used to collect temporal spectral vegetation indices (SVIs) during the grain filling period, along with synchronized measurements of grain weight. The logistic function was applied to fit the dynamic changes between SVIs and grain weight, and the red-edge chlorophyll index (CIRE) was identified as the SVI most closely related to GFR. Machine learning models, including Random Forest Regressor (RFR), Support Vector Regression (SVR), and Linear Regression (LR), were constructed to predict GFR, and their performance was evaluated using r² and RMSE. The results showed that the r² values of the logistic fitting dynamic curves between SVIs and measured grain weight reached 0.87 and 0.92, respectively. The dynamic change rate of CIRE exhibited a significantly positive correlation with GFR (r=0.4-0.43, P<0.05). Among the models, RFR demonstrated the best predictive performance, with r² values of 0.88 and 0.89 and RMSE values of 0.27 and 0.32 for the full datasets in 2022 and 2023, respectively, significantly outperforming SVR and LR. Similarly, RFR achieved higher prediction accuracy and generalization capability in specific genotype datasets. Therefore, based on UAV multi-spectral data, the wheat grain filling rate was monitored by combining CIRE and RFR with high-precision and high-throughout. This method provides essential technical support for the evaluation of wheat germplasm resources and breeding for stress resistance.

Wheat above ground biomass (AGB) serves as a crucial indicator for assessing its growth status. Currently, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) equipped with various optical sensors have been extensively utilized for monitoring wheat AGB. However, in the late stages of wheat growth, high vegetation coverage hinders optical sensors from capturing information within the canopy, thereby diminishing the accuracy of AGB monitoring. To mitigate this issue, this study incorporated point cloud characteristic parameters (PCs), which are related to canopy height, as representative indicators of canopy structure for estimating AGB using spectral indices, including color indices (CIs) and vegetation indices (VIs). The accuracy of AGB estimation models was then compared before and after the inclusion of PCs. The results revealed variations in the effectiveness of AGB estimation using different characteristic parameters during the jointing, heading, and filling stages of wheat growth. In the training set, the effect of CIs was slightly lower than that of VIs, while in the validation set, it was marginally higher. Although PCs did not exhibit the most remarkable performance across the three key periods, their stability was notably strong, and certain canopy structural characteristics demonstrated potential for AGB prediction. When individual features were used for AGB prediction, the r² values ranged from 0.47 to 0.75. In contrast, integrating the three features of CIs, VIs, and PCs substantially enhanced the accuracy of the AGB estimation model. Specifically, during the three growth stages, the model's r² values were 0.79, 0.81, and 0.77, and the root mean square error (RMSE) was 0.42, 0.74, and 0.80 t·hm^-2, respectively. Among different types of remote sensing features, support vector machine regression (SVM) provided superior estimation results compared to Gaussian process regression (GPR). Therefore, by integrating the three features (CIs, VIs, and PCs) and employing the SVM algorithm, an effective estimation of wheat AGB can be achi.

Fasciclin-like arabinogalactan protein (FLA), a class of highly glycosylated proteins, are widely involved in plant growth, development and stress responses, yet their functional mechanisms in wheat remain unclear. To investigate the members and biological roles of FLA in wheat, this study conducted genome-wide identification and systematic analysis of the wheat FLA family using bioinformatics approaches. The RNA-Seq and qRT-PCR were employed to examine the expression patterns of TaFLAs across tissues and under abiotic stresses, while haplotype analysis was performed to explore the association between candidate genes and kernel weight-related traits. A total of 71 TaFLAs were identified in wheat, distributed across 17 chromosomes and designated TaFLA1 to TaFLA71. Phylogenetic analysis classified these genes into eight subfamilies, with members within the same subfamily exhibiting conserved gene structures and motifs, suggesting functional similarity. Intraspecific synteny analysis revealed 85 segmental duplication pairs (30 interchromosomal and 55 intrachromosomal duplications), while interspecific synteny highlighted closer evolutionary relationships between TaFLAs and BdFLAs from Brachypodium distachyon. The RNA-Seq and qRT-PCR results demonstrated widespread expression of TaFLAs across tissues and under stress conditions. Notably, TaFLA15, TaFLA34 and TaFLA62 showed high expression in spikes and grains, while TaFLA5, TaFLA15, TaFLA34 and TaFLA62 were upregulated under PEG 6000 treatment; TaFLA5 and TaFLA34 were induced by NaCl stress. A SNP molecular marker developed for TaFLA62 revealed, combined association analysis and geographical-temporal distribution studies, that the TaFLA62-HapⅡ haplotype significantly enhances kernel weight and has undergone positive selection during wheat breeding. Overall, the gene structure of wheat TaFLAs is similar, and most of them can respond to adversity stress, and its TaFLA62-apⅡ haplotype can be used to improve wheat yield traits.