Here, we discuss how climate change is predicted to affect seed germination and vigor and how recent advances in understanding these processes can be applied to enable high agricultural productivity under these changing conditions. In particular, rapid and synchronous seed germination and seedling growth are particularly important to agricultural output because they are essential for the establishment of seedlings in the field. For the majority of crops, seeds are the delivery system for transferring advanced genetics into the production field. Due to reduced sequencing and genotyping costs, genomics and advanced phenotyping are transforming breeding strategies and the development of new cultivars of resilient crops (Edwards and Batley 2010 Voss-Fels and Snowdon 2016). Despite traditional breeding efforts, certain stages of the crop life cycle remain particularly sensitive to climate factors, including flowering, pollination, seed development, germination, and seedling growth. Climate change will negatively affect global food supplies, so research on improving agricultural output under deteriorating climate conditions is necessary to ensure global food security. Increases in temperature and carbon dioxide and changes in precipitation over the 21st century pose a threat to agricultural productivity in the coming decades (Batley and Edwards 2016 Vogel et al. ![]() In this review, we discuss these recent advances in the genetic underpinnings of seed performance as well as how climate change is expected to affect vigor in current varieties of staple, vegetable, and other crops. Recent strides in understanding the genetic basis of variation in seed vigor have used genomics and transcriptomics to identify candidate genes for improving germination, and several studies have explored the potential impact of climate change on the percentage and timing of germination. To improve seed germination speed and success, much research has focused on selecting quality seeds for replanting, priming seeds before sowing, and breeding varieties with improved seed performance. Warming trends and increasing temperature variability can increase seed dormancy and reduce germination rates, especially in crops that require lower temperatures for germination and seedling establishment. Heat stress in mature seeds can reduce seed vigor in crops such as lettuce, oat, and chickpea. ![]() Elevated temperature during early seed development can decrease seed size, number, and fertility, delay germination and reduce seed vigor in crops such as cereals, legumes, and vegetable crops. Seed vigor, a complex agronomic trait that includes seed longevity, germination speed, seedling growth, and early stress tolerance, determines the duration and success of this establishment period. Maintaining high yields will require the successful and uniform establishment of plants in the field under altered environmental conditions. In the coming decades, maintaining a steady food supply for the increasing world population will require high-yielding crop plants which can be productive under increasingly variable conditions.
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