Crops Energy

This edited book summarizes the efforts made to develop sustainable bioenergy production through different generations. The topics included in the book cover information about different bioenergy crops, their classification and use as biofuel, agronomic practices to improve biomass yield, classic breeding techniques, genetic diversity, current status and future perspective of bioenergy crops in the omics era. It also discusses application of modern biotechnological and molecular biotechnological techniques for the improvement of bioenergy crops this having enhanced biomass and plant based products. The book explores growing biofuel crops and their impact on environment, bioethics and biosafety issues related to the modern approaches. Another important aspect is the incorporation of nanotechnology for bioenergy crops and biofuel production. All book chapters are contributed renowned researchers in their respective field. This is a unique book covering the bioeneragy crops in the modern omics era. The book is useful for the researchers and post-graduate students to guide them in the field of bioenergy crops.

This book provides important insights into the combustion behavior of novel energy crops and agricultural fuels. It describes a new experimental approach to combustion evaluation, involving fundamental, bench-scale and commercial-scale studies. The studies presented were conducted on two representative biomass energy crops: a woody biomass poplar (Populus sp. or poplar) and an herbaceous biomass brassica (Brassica carinata or brassica).

Biotic stresses cause yield loss of 31-42% in crops in addition to 6-20% during post-harvest stage. Understanding interaction of crop plants to the biotic stresses caused by insects, bacteria, fungi, viruses, and oomycetes, etc. is important to develop resistant crop varieties. Knowledge on the advanced genetic and genomic crop improvement strategies including molecular breeding, transgenics, genomic-assisted breeding and the recently emerging genome editing for developing resistant varieties in technical crops is imperative for addressing FHEE (food, health, energy and environment) security. Whole genome sequencing of these crops followed by genotyping-by-sequencing have facilitated precise information about the genes conferring resistance useful for gene discovery, allele mining and shuttle breeding which in turn opened up the scope for 'designing' crop genomes with resistance to biotic stresses.

​This Brief examines the sustainability of energy use in global food production and processing. The nexus between food, water, and energy are explored against a background of climate change. Current efforts to reduce the energy intensity of food and increase sustainability are explored.

This book performs a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis to examine the current food crisis and how it relates to the use of crops for energy.