Preface

Rice (*Oryza sativa*) feeds more than 3.5 billion people on planet Earth, but more rice will be needed to meet the demand of population growth. Rice requires more water compared to other crops, as noted in the translation for the Chinese name for rice, "Water Grain." Today, rice has been grown in a wide range of areas from rainfed low- and uplands to irrigated areas and in many areas where other crops would fail. As the standard of living increases, more people are moving to cities and more rice fields are being replaced due to urban development. Rice production has been subjected to an increasing amount of constraints, including shortages of arable land, labor, water, and biotic and abiotic stressors. Consequentially, the supply of water is decreasing drastically: more wetlands will disappear, and more water will be contaminated, resulting in an increased concern for sustainability and the environmental consequences of rice production.

Rice was the first crop whose genome sequence was reliably determined and for whom tremendous resources composed of worldwide rice germplasm collections was assembled. Many mapping populations, genetic stocks, mutants and wild rice relatives, and high-density genetic and expression maps for rice have also been accumulated rapidly. Many of the global research accomplishments during the early 21st century have built the fundamental basis of rice grain protection through an improved understanding of genetics, genomics, and host–pathogen interactions.

In this book, a wide range of topics is included such as rice germplasm collection, methods to increase yield, nutritional benefits, rice response mechanisms to increasingly virulent pathogens, functional genomics, and host–pathogen interactions. This book is composed of 12 chapters from scientists around the globe and it is hoped that it will spread their ideas for and successes with safeguarding rice crops to ensure sufficient food supplies that meet human needs on Earth for years to come.

I hope that the knowledge from this book will benefit rice specialists, farmers, and students who are interested in molecular genetics, biology, pathology, and crop protection. This book could not have been prepared without the help of many scientists and specialists who generously contributed their time and expertise in writing and production. All authors of this book are appreciated for their extra efforts to contribute their knowledge, skills, visions, and philosophies despite the various imposing deadlines. Special appreciation is given to my daughter Mary S. Jia who assisted me in editing and completing this book. The top-notch research that has been conducted around the world is fragmented and unhelpful to students and other scientists who are seeking rice crop improvement. It is only through comprehensive reviews, such as this book, that the spread of such knowledge may be accomplished to propagate the current techniques and theories that may, one day, facilitate world peace.

This book is dedicated to Professor Wenrong Liu (a plant pathology laboratory instructor of Xichang Agricultural College, China), deceased on February 20, 1992, and Mr. Robert Spencer Edsall Jr. (a farmer, USA), deceased on May 10, 2019, who

were Dr. Jia's former mentors on plant pathology and farming practice. Mr. Edsall was also one of the sponsors for Dr. Jia's MS (1993) of the University of Florida through Edsall Groves Service Inc., Florida, USA, and for Communicating for Agricultural Exchange Program.
