Excessive use of nitrogen fertilizers and inefficient crop N utilization results in serious environmental and ecological issues in addition to raising costs for farmers. Being the most influencing nutrient for plant growth, efficient N use while simultaneously reducing N losses is required for an optimum balance between the supply and demand of N. However, N cycling within the soil-plant system is very complicated and dynamic due to the involvement of intricate processes which require the interaction of several soil, climate, and plant processes.

Some fundamental challenges include the need to develop/ identify protocols to quantify relevant traits functionally related to crop performances and to utilize these procedures for monitoring crop real-time performance in terms of both N-uptake and use efficiencies. Additionally, a better understanding of low-N tolerance and regulation of high-affinity nitrate transporters to regulate N uptake and its incorporation into amino acids is essential. Since optimum nitrogen uptake directly influences crop growth and yield, understanding the mechanisms involved in contributing to Low-N tolerance will enable scientists to develop better-performing crop varieties. Also, this will pave the way for the molecular breeding of crops with high nitrogen usage efficiency and the development of sustainable agriculture practices.

Another important aspect to consider is the N-leaching from soils which seriously affects the ecosystem. In this context, the use of slow-release N-fertilizers or the development of novel fertilizers could offer a solution to minimize N-losses. Maintaining growth and production at the same by efficiently using less N is the main goal that can be potentially achieved by a complete understanding of plant physiological functioning at the whole plant, cell, and molecular level and by exploiting integrated management N practices.

The focus of this Research Topic is therefore primarily on (i) reducing N-inputs to the soil through agronomic practices such as crop rotation, adopting appropriate cropping for specific areas, residue management, green manuring, and inter-cropping with legumes, (ii) exploring the sustainable strategies to reduce N losses such as using slow-release fertilizers, monitoring real-time N-levels in crops and precise application of fertilizer, effective management of manure, (iii) enhancing N use efficiency by using N efficient crop cultivars and genetic improvements, and (iv) screening low-N tolerance.

We invite original research articles, reviews, perspectives, and opinions that demonstrate approaches to reduce the extensive N-inputs and losses and discuss how we can promote N-use efficiency in a complex soil-plant system.

A special focus is on the following themes:

(i) Analyzing the role and impacts of sustainable farming systems to reduce N inputs and enhancing crop utilization efficiency
(ii) Development and use of precision farming systems including remote sensing and hyperspectral imaging for real-time monitoring of crop N-demands and timely and precise application of N fertilizers
(iii) Quantifying N loss under different types of N fertilizers and subsequent management strategies
(iv) Developing diagnosis methods as tools for crop phenotyping to identify low-N tolerant and N efficient genotypes
(v) Selecting candidate genes for the development of molecular markers to develop low-N tolerant genotypes

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Frontiers in Plant Science

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