This book marks the centenary of the rediscovery of Mendel's laws of biological inheritance, which have had their greatest economic impact in the rapid development in plant breeding. The concepts and methodology of plant breeding with their underpinning of advances in classical and molecular genetics and biotechnology have received special attention.

This monograph documents the development of methods of plant breeding over a hundred year period beginning with some of the landmark discoveries in classical and molecular genetics. Plant breeding in the 21st century will be marked with an increasing integration of the current methods with the newer techniques of modern biotechnology, this book points to the kind of integration which will be taking place. Its 31 review chapters cover a wide range of topics.

Some of the topics covered include molecular cytogenetics; transposable elements; chromosome manipulations; host-pathogen interactions; quantitative trait loci; simple and recurrent selection methods; heterosis breeding; mutation breeding; plant genetic resources and intellectual property rights; plant genomics; and molecular approaches in crop improvement. This book contains papers which revisit some of the landmark discoveries in genetics and plant breeding.