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Garlic is an important vegetable, aromatic and nutraceutical crop. The constant increase in garlic production and the demand for garlic products with specific characteristics require breeding and selection of this crop and its adaptation to different climatic conditions. Commercial garlic varieties are completely sterile and are propagated vegetatively. For ages new varieties have been selected only from existing living collections, natural or induced mutations. In the last 20 years, garlic fertility has been restored and research and breeding have undergone rapid progress. Currently, breeding in garlic is developing in three main directions: conventional vegetative selection from variable germplasm collections, breeding and selection from sexually- reproduced populations and employment of biotechnological tools. Cleaning from viruses and diseases and micropropagation of outstanding varieties can improve the existing garlic cultivars. However, novel methods of genome editing and marker-assisted breeding are not yet available due to the extremely large and repetitive garlic genome. Fertility restoration, hybridization and seed production are the most important goals in future breeding. The variability of seed-producing garlic lines is already available, but breeding and propagation from seed is still far from the commercial stage. Large investments are involved in the developing of seed-propagated garlic and breeding via hybridization, but the advantages of this approach for the future improvement of modern garlic are evident. The status of garlic research and breeding and possible ways for future research and practices are discussed. |
