Rapid breeding of an early maturing, high-quality, and high-y.ielding rice cultivar using marker‑assisted selection coupled with optimized anther culture.

With the global shift towards healthier eating habits, the focus of the rice industry has evolved from quantity to quality. In China, the Yangtze River Basin is the main area consuming long-grain and high-quality indica rice. Hubei Province, a significant rice-producing area, currently cultivates a limited range of rice varieties, risking degradation and diminishing economic returns. Therefore, it is imperative to cultivate elite rice varieties tailored to the local production conditions and can significantly enhance the added value. This study bred the novel rice cultivar "Runxiangyu", characterized by early maturity, high quality, and high yield. It is a hybrid of Ezhong 5, known for its moderate height and excellent quality, albeit with a long growth period and lack of fragrance, and Yuzhenxiang, renowned for its high quality, short growth period, and fragrance but limited by its tall stature and poor tillering ability. The breeding process utilized optimized anther culture coupled with molecular marker-assisted selection (MAS) and phenotype analysis. In the field, the developed cultivar was 120.9 cm tall and had an entire growth period of 117.5 days, demonstrating moderate disease resistance and excellent heat tolerance. Its grains are fragrant, meeting the national standard of grade two high-quality rice set by the Food Quality Supervision and Inspection Center of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Areas). Exhibiting superior agronomic traits, such as plant type, height, growth period, and stress resistance, along with and quality attributes, including grain shape, chalkiness, fragrance, and taste, "Runxiangyu" was certified by the Agricultural Crop Variety Certification Commission of Hubei in 2022. These findings suggested that molecular MAS coupled with optimized anther culture and multi-site phenotype analysis is an efficient and rapid method for crop breeding. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11032-024-01495-4.