Improving production efficiency of African Eggplant (Solanum aethiopicum) for smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa

营养不良影响地球上三分之一的人，20亿人缺乏一种或多种微量营养素。在撒哈拉以南非洲，营养不良是一个长期存在的问题。生物多样性营养园艺作物的可持续生产和消费是解决这一问题的关键部分。有许多本土蔬菜品种在非洲种植并在当地市场上出售，主要由女性生产者作为减轻贫困的收入来源。然而，这些作物中的许多都没有得到充分的研究，它们的全部潜力还没有实现。非洲茄子就是这样一种作物。在西非和东非，它作为一种叶类蔬菜和水果被广泛消费。白果茄子与茄子与番茄番茄马铃薯茄子与番茄茄子马铃薯茄子与这些茄属植物类似，土壤水分的可获得性和土壤的健康状况，如是否有病害，将极大地影响生产力和营养含量。因此，通过更好的水管理战略、改善土壤健康和种植对水分胁迫更具弹性的品种，非洲茄子的生产有巨大的潜力。在这里，我们将采用两个主要方法来最大限度地提高非洲茄子产量：1)开发新的植物和作物管理战略，以提高产量；2)表征遗传多样性，以确定更具抗旱性的非洲茄子种质。为了提供灌溉非洲茄子的最佳实践，我们将描述当前的商业品种对一系列土壤水分不足的反应。在受控条件下，我们将确定支持最佳产量和营养质量的土壤基质势和体积含水率的范围。我们将测试使用高光谱成像来识别植物水分胁迫开始的可能性，并将其用作识别耐水品系的工具。在实地测试之前，将在非洲的盆栽实验中进一步研究对土壤缺水的反应。我们还将确定苗圃植物在种植到田间之前是否可以为更好地适应土壤水分胁迫和土壤健康做好准备。这将通过使用温和的枯萎胁迫和使用丛枝菌根来诱导更好的植株表现来实现。我们最终的植物管理策略是改善土壤健康。首先，我们将描述非洲农场土壤中存在的DNA，以了解存在的微生物，从而了解土壤健康。这将告知哪些土壤改良剂最有潜力改善土壤健康，并将在农场进行测试。我们将评估这些管理做法对非洲茄子产量的影响，并考虑到经济成本和农民对制定最佳做法指南的偏好。在改善作物管理的同时，我们将对我们收藏的大量种质进行特色化。为了了解潜在的多样性，我们将对20个种质的基因组进行重新测序，并鉴定变异。我们将在我们收集的种子中进行繁殖，并与农民一起评估干旱易发地区的160份种质，并鉴定哪些品系对土壤水分有效性较低的适应性更强。根据农民的反馈，我们将更详细地描述首选材料的表型特征，并启动表现最好的品系的杂交，以推进当前的育种计划。为了帮助为育种工作提供信息，我们将描述非洲茄子种群的特征，这些种群因其在日益严重的土壤缺水情况下生长的能力而被隔离。我们将确定可以在育种计划中部署的与更好的抗旱能力有关的分子标记。

Malnutrition affects one in three people on the planet, with 2 billion people being deficient in one or more micronutrients. In Sub-Saharan Africa malnutrition is a chronic problem. The sustainable production and consumption of biodiverse nutritious horticultural crops provide a key part of the solution to this problem. There are many indigenous vegetable species that are grown in Africa and sold in local markets, mainly by female producers, as a source of income to alleviate their poverty. However, many of these crops are under-researched and their full potential has not been realised. African eggplant, Solanum aethiopicum, is such a crop. It is widely consumed across both West and East Africa as a leafy vegetable and also as a fruit. Solanum aethiopicum is closely related to Solanum melongena, aubergine/eggplant, and to tomato, Solanum lycopersicum and potato, Solanum tuberosum. Similar to these Solanum species, the availability of soil water and the health of the soil, as defined by the presence or absence of diseases, will greatly affect productivity and nutritive content. There is therefore an immense potential to improve the production of African eggplant through better water management strategies, improving soil health and growing varieties that are more resilient to water stress. Here we will adopt two major approaches to maximise African eggplant production: 1) developing new plant and crop management strategies to improve production; 2) characterise the genetic diversity towards identifying more drought resilient accessions of African eggplant. To inform best practice for irrigating African eggplant we will characterise the current commercial varieties' responses to a range of soil water deficits. Under controlled conditions we will identify the range of soil matric potentials and volumetric water contents that support optimum yields and nutritive quality. We will test the potential of using hyperspectral imaging to identify the onset of plant water stress and its use as a tool to identify water resilient lines. Responses to soil water deficits will be further investigated in pot experiments in Africa prior to testing in the field. We will also determine if nursery plants can be primed for a greater resilience to soil water stress and soil health before planting in the field. This will be done by using a mild wilting stress and the use of arbuscular mycorrhiza to induce better plant performance. Our final plant management strategy is to improve soil health. First we will characterise the DNA present in the soil on African farms to gain understanding of the microbes present and thus soil health. This will inform which soil amendments will have greatest potential to improve soil health, and these will be tested on the farms. We will assess the effect of these management practices on African eggplant productivity and take into account the economic cost and farmer preference towards generating best practice guides. At the same time as improving crop management we will characterise the extensive germplasm in our collection. To gain understanding of the potential diversity we will resequence the genomes of 20 accessions and identify the variation. We will multiply the seed in our collection and evaluate, in association with farmers, 160 accessions in drought-prone areas and characterise which lines are more resilient to low soil water availability. Based on farmer feedback we will phenotypically characterise in more detail the preferred accessions and initiate crosses of the best performing lines to advance current breeding programmes. To help inform breeding efforts, we will characterise a population of African eggplants that segregate for their ability to grow under increasing soil water deficits. We will identify molecular markers that are linked to better drought resilience that can be deployed in the breeding programmes.