Abstract:

Since 2018, with the implementation of the “National Joint Research on Broccoli Breeding” by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, important progress has been made in the research of broccoli breeding in China. The new broccoli varieties have achieved important breakthroughs in head traits, such as bud color and head shape. The market share of self-cultivated broccoli varieties has increased from less than 5% in 2018 year to about 35% in 2023 year, and haploid induction technology has been widely applied to breeding practice, genetic transformation and gene editing technologies have made breakthroughs, genome and molecular marker-assisted breeding technologys play important roles in breeding. This article reviewed the important progress in the important commodity characters of broccoli head, breeding technology and new variety breeding in China in recent years. Based on the results of phylogenetic tree analysis of Chinese self-cultivated varieties and control varieties, and combined with the historical replacement of main cultivated varieties, Chinese broccoli varieties were divided into three historical stages and 17 evolutionary groups (clusters), and the newly bred varieties such as Zheqing, Bilyu, Meiao and Tailyu were at the top of the evolutionary tree. In recent years, the main directions of broccoli breeding are still early maturity and wide adaptability, and the future breeding directions are disease resistance, stress resistance and suitable for mechanized production, and at the same time, it should shift from appearance quality to fresh processing quality and functional nutrition quality.

Key words: broccoli, breeding, variety, head