Humble yet significant role of mungbean in achieving self-sufficiency in pulses

Abstract

With more than 15 years’ experience in research and development of pulses, Dr. Aditya Pratap has made outstanding contributions in the area of genetic improvement of pulses that include development of improved plant varieties and breeding materials through conventional and molecular breeding, development of new genomic resources, establishment of wide hybridization garden and initiating prebreeding and distant hybridization in Vigna. He is associated with development of 9 superior varieties of mungbean and 3 of chickpea. With a lead role in development of the mungbean varieties, he developed world’s first earliest variety ‘Virat’ maturing in <55 days and also one of the first MABC-derived varieties of chickpea, ‘Samriddhi’. His other significant accomplishments include development of trait-specific Vigna and chickpea donors, identification of photo-thermo tolerant Vigna genotypes, establishment of useful markertrait associations, development of smartphone application tool “Mung Advisor”, and molecular and morphological characterization of wild Vigna. He has >200 publications, 8 edited books and many awards and accolades to his credit including the prestigious ICAR Lal Bahadur Shastri Outstanding Young Scientist Award.