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  • © 2018

Cold Tolerance in Plants

Physiological, Molecular and Genetic Perspectives

  • International experts shared their latest findings on plant cold stress tolerance
  • Improved methodologies and systems to enhance plant growth in cold-stressed environment
  • Offers scientific paradigms for other abiotic stress-related studies in agriculture research

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Table of contents (10 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xiv
  2. Cold-Induced Injuries and Signaling Responses in Plants

    • Jigeesha Mukhopadhyay, Aryadeep Roychoudhury
    Pages 1-35
  3. Molecular Genetic Approaches for the Identification of Candidate Cold Stress Tolerance Genes

    • Muhammad Qudrat Ullah Farooqi, Zahra Zahra, Ju Kyong Lee
    Pages 37-51
  4. Redox Regulation of Cold Stress Response

    • Venura Herath
    Pages 53-64
  5. Hormonal Regulation of Cold Stress Response

    • Mohammad Arif Ashraf, Abidur Rahman
    Pages 65-88
  6. Proteomic Responses to Cold Stress

    • Towseef Mohsin Bhat, Sana Choudhary, Nirala Ramchiary
    Pages 111-125
  7. What Can Small Molecules Tell Us About Cold Stress Tolerance in Plants?

    • Valentina Longo, Mohsen Janmohammadi, Lello Zolla, Sara Rinalducci
    Pages 127-157
  8. Breeding Cold-Tolerant Crops

    • Elisabetta Frascaroli
    Pages 159-177
  9. Genetically Engineering Cold Stress-Tolerant Crops: Approaches and Challenges

    • Rohit Joshi, Balwant Singh, Viswanathan Chinnusamy
    Pages 179-195
  10. Back Matter

    Pages 197-203

About this book

Cold stress is one of the prevalent environmental stresses affecting crop productivity, particularly in temperate regions. Numerous plant types of tropical or subtropical origin are injured or killed by non-freezing low temperature, and display a range of symptoms of chilling injury such as chlorosis, necrosis, or growth retardation. In contrast, chilling tolerant species thrive well at such temperatures. To thrive under cold stress conditions, plants have evolved complex mechanisms to identify peripheral signals that allow them to counter varying environmental conditions. These mechanisms include stress perception, signal transduction, transcriptional activation of stress-responsive target genes, and synthesis of stress-related proteins and other molecules, which help plants to strive through adverse environmental conditions. Conventional breeding methods have met with limited success in improving the cold tolerance of important crop plants through inter-specific or inter-generic hybridization. A better understanding of physiological, biochemical and molecular responses and tolerance mechanisms, and discovery of novel stress-responsive pathways and genes may contribute to efficient engineering strategies that enhance cold stress tolerance. It is therefore imperative to accelerate the efforts to unravel the biochemical, physiological and molecular mechanisms underlying cold stress tolerance in plants.

Through this new book, we intend to integrate the contributions from plant scientists targeting cold stress tolerance mechanisms using physiological, biochemical, molecular, structural and systems biology approaches. It is hoped that this collection will serve as a reference source for those who are interested in or are actively engaged in cold stress research.

Editors and Affiliations

  • Mountain Research Centre for Field Crops Khudwani, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir, Srinagar, India

    Shabir Hussain Wani

  • Department of Agricultural Biology, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Peradeniya, Peradeniya, Sri Lanka

    Venura Herath

About the editors

Dr. Shabir Hussain Wani is senior assistant professor at Mountain Research Centre for Field Crops, Khudwani –192101, Sher-e-Kashmir University  of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir, J&K, India . He received his B.Sc. in agriculture from BhimRao Agricultural University Agra, India, and M.Sc. in genetics and plant breeding from Central Agricultural University, Manipur, India, and Ph.D. in plant breeding and genetics on “transgenic rice for abiotic stress tolerance” from the Punjab Agricultural University Ludhiana, India. After obtaining his Ph.D. he worked as research associate in the Biotechnology Laboratory, Central Institute of Temperate Horticulture (ICAR), Srinagar, India. He then joined the Krishi Vigyan Kendra (Farm Science Centre) as program coordinator  at Senapati, Manipur, India. He teaches courses related to plant breeding, seed science and technology, and stress breeding and has published more than 100 papers/chapters in journals andbooks of international and national repute. He served as guest editor and reviews editor for journal Frontier in Plant Science (2015-2018). He has also edited several books on current topics in crop improvement for abiotic stress tolerance published by Springer Nature and CRC Press USA. His Ph.D. research won first prize in the North Zone Competition, at national level, in India. He was awarded a Young Scientist Award from the Society for Promotion of Plant Sciences, Jaipur, India, in 2009. He is a fellow of the Society for Plant Research, India. Recently, he received Young Scientist Award (Agriculture) 2015 from Society for Plant Research, Meerut, India. He also served as visiting Scientist at Department of Plant Soil and Microbial Sciences, Michigan State University, USA under the UGC Raman Post Doctoral Fellowship programme. He has attended several international and national conferences, presenting his research.


Dr. Venura Herath is a Senior Lecturerat Department of Agricultural Biology, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. He obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Agriculture from University of Peradeniya. His doctoral studies were carried out at University of Maine, USA on “Transcriptional regulatory networks involved in plant responses to low temperature”. After completion of PhD, he served as a senior lecturer at Department of Agricultural Biology, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka and he is currently serving as the Head of the Department. Dr. Herath teaches courses on functional and stress genomics at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. His findings on abiotic stress response gene networks are published in both national and international journals. Currently, he is working on development of future ready rice by modulating key transcriptional factors using transgenic and genome editing technologies. He won the Norris Charles Clements Graduate Student Award in 2011 and the Presidential Awards for Research Publications in 2012.

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 129.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book USD 169.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access