Different avenues for progress apply to drought tolerance, water use efficiency and yield in dry areas

Drought tolerance, water use efficiency (WUE) and yield in dry areas are often considered as synonyms. However, they correspond to markedly different suites of physiological mechanisms, based on combinations of alleles constrained by evolution into consistent strategies. Improving (i) drought tolerance, sensu stricto, involves extreme conservative strategy with protection and repair mechanisms; (ii) WUE most often results in small plants but avenues exist with lower penalties for growth, that is, by reducing night transpiration; (iii) yield for drought prone areas involves both constititutive traits (e.g. phenology or plant architecture), favourable for most environmental scenarios, and adaptive physiological traits whose effects suited to a given scenario. Genetic improvement of the latter would requires identification of scenario dependent combinations of alleles, involving phenomics, modelling and genomic prediction.

Automated summary

Drought tolerance, water use efficiency, and yield are different physiological mechanisms that play important roles in dry areas. Improving drought tolerance requires conservative strategies with protection and repair mechanisms, while increasing water use efficiency can be achieved by reducing night transpiration. Yield in drought-prone areas depends on factors such as phenology, plant architecture, and adaptive physiological traits.