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Climate-related drought is a major physical stress that affects crop productivity. Currently, up to 45 per cent of the world’s agricultural land, where around 40 per cent of the world’s human population resides, is subjected to continuous or frequent drought.

Due to the worldwide impact of drought and associated stresses on crops, there is an urgent demand for a sustainable solution.

In a review paper published in the , researchers at the University of ÐÂÀ˲ÊƱ’s School of Agriculture, Food and Wine have summarised seven years of research published in more than 20 international journals, on the effect of drought on cereal plants such as wheat and barley. 

“The knowledge we’ve discovered in this significant body of work holds promise for informed decisions on transcription factor applications to bioengineer plants with enhanced tolerance to drought and other abiotic stresses."Professor Maria Hrmova.

This research has used mainly molecular biology techniques in combination with structural bioinformatics (