TOMRES: Screening Of Traditional Tomato Varieties For Water Use Efficiency And Nutrient Use Efficiency

Traditional varieties of tomato from the Mediterranean region represent a pool of biodiversity that can be mined for novel traits that can be used for the genetic improvement of commercial tomato varieties. As urban development and climate change exacerbate competition for water and critical resources, it is essential commercial production of vegetables increases the Water Use Efficiency (WUE) and Nutrient/Nitrate Use Efficiency (NUE) in order to reduce the environmental impacts in terms of water and fertilizer (Hirel et al., 2007; Erisman et al., 2008). In order to address the anticipated need for improvement of existing commercial varieties (Ruggiero et al., 2017), we are screening over 40 traditional tomato varieties for their WUE, NUE and combined stress indexes to identify genotypes that are particularly efficient in their use of water, nitrogen, or both these critical resources. The best performing genotypes will be further evaluated at the molecular and genetic level to determine which traits and genes are responsible for increased WUE and NUE.