Advancing Stress Adaptation Mechanisms in Underutilized and Neglected Grain Crops for Climate-Resilient Food Systems

Underutilized and neglected grain crops, including pseudocereals such as quinoa, amaranth, and buckwheat, as well as minor cereals and traditional grain types (e.g., millet and wheat-derived products such as bulgur), have exceptional potential to sustain agriculture under intensifying climate stress due to their inherent adaptability to drought, salinity, heat, and marginal soils. These species often exhibit high resource-use efficiency, resilience to environmental extremes, and broad genetic diversity, while also contributing superior nutritional quality and enhanced biodiversity in cropping systems compared to major cereals. As climate change intensifies the frequency and complexity of abiotic stresses, underutilized and neglected grain crops are increasingly recognized as key components of sustainable and climate-smart agricultural systems, supporting future food and nutritional security.Emerging studies highlight significant progress in genomics, transcriptomics, and molecular breeding for these crops, offering new opportunities to dissect stress tolerance pathways and develop resilient cultivars. However, substantial fundamental and translational gaps remain in understanding how these species perceive, integrate, and adapt to complex and multiple abiotic stress environments. Despite their adaptive potential, the mechanistic basis of stress perception, signal integration, and acclimation in underutilized and neglected grain crops remains fragmented. In particular, the coordination among redox homeostasis, phytohormone crosstalk, calcium signaling, ion transport, osmotic regulation, and epigenetic control under single and combined stress conditions is still poorly understood. Moreover, most current stress biology paradigms are derived from major cereals, leaving a critical knowledge gap regarding whether these underutilized species rely on conserved stress-response networks or possess unique regulatory modules. Addressing this gap is essential not only for improving these crops themselves, but also for identifying transferable stress-adaptive traits applicable to major cereal breeding programs.This Research Topic aims to elucidate the physiological, molecular, and regulatory mechanisms underlying abiotic stress tolerance in underutilized and neglected grain crops under single and combined stress conditions. By integrating multi-omics approaches, signaling network analyses, and stress memory frameworks, this Topic seeks to identify key adaptive traits and regulatory modules that confer resilience under climate variability. The ultimate goal is to translate this knowledge into climate-smart breeding and management strategies that enhance yield stability and nutritional security in a changing climate.We strongly encourage researchers from diverse disciplines to contribute their expertise to this Research Topic. We welcome submissions of all article types accepted by Frontiers in Plant Science, with particular emphasis on mechanistic, hypothesis-driven, and translational studies that advance both fundamental understanding and practical exploitation of abiotic stress resilience in underutilized and neglected grain crops.Submissions may include, but are not limited to, the following themes:• Comparative stress physiology of underutilized grain crops and major cereals under drought, salinity, heat, cold, and nutrient stress• Redox signaling, ROS dynamics, and antioxidant systems under extreme and combined stress conditions• Phytohormone crosstalk and signal integration (ABA, auxin, ethylene, jasmonates, brassinosteroids, strigolactones)• Ion transporters, osmolyte metabolism, and cellular compartmentalization during salinity and osmotic stress• Transcriptomic, proteomic, metabolomic, lipidomic, and epigenomic regulation of stress responses• Stress priming, memory, and transgenerational tolerance mechanisms• Genetic resources, genome editing, and molecular breeding of stress-resilient underutilized grain crops• Systems biology and modeling approaches for predicting stress adaptation• Climate-smart agronomic and biotechnological strategies to enhance yield stability and nutritional quality in marginal environments. Topic editors: María Reguera, Muhammad Waqas, Hassan Iqbal Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/78215/advancing-stress-adaptation-mechanisms-in-underutilized-and-neglected-grain-crops-for-climate-resilient-food-systems