Hybrid rice breakthrough: Boosting yields and combating inbreeding for farmers.
The study looked at how different rice plants mix together to create better offspring. They compared 17 parent plants with their 10 hybrid offspring for traits like plant height and grain yield. The hybrids generally did better than their parents, showing significant improvements in most traits. Some hybrids, like 17A×45R and 25A×37R, had the highest grain yield. They also looked at how inbreeding affected the offspring, finding both positive and negative effects. Overall, choosing the right parent plants is crucial for making high-yielding hybrid rice varieties.