Grasslands cover a significant proportion of the agricultural land within the UK and across the EU, providing a relatively cheap source of feed for ruminants and supporting the production of meat, wool and milk from grazing animals. Delivering efficient animal production from grassland systems has traditionally been the primary focus of grassland‐based research. But there is increasing recognition of the ecological and environmental benefits of these grassland systems and the importance of the interaction between their component plants and a host of other biological organisms in the soil and in adjoining habitats. Many of the ecological and environmental benefits provided by grasslands emanate from the interactions between the roots of plant species and the soil in which they grow. We review current knowledge on the role of grassland ecosystems in delivering ecological and environmental benefits. We will consider how improved grassland can deliver these benefits, and the potential opportunities for plant breeding to improve specific traits that will enhance these benefits whilst maintaining forage production for livestock consumption. Opportunities for exploiting new plant breeding approaches, including high throughput phenotyping, and for introducing traits from closely related species are discussed.

中文翻译：

---

对具有环境和生态效益的多年生草和豆类品种的根性状进行了新的强调。

草原覆盖了英国和整个欧盟的大部分农业用地，为反刍动物提供了相对便宜的饲料来源，并支持了由放牧动物生产肉，羊毛和牛奶。传统上，从草地系统提供有效的动物生产一直是基于草地的研究的重点。但是，人们越来越认识到这些草地系统的生态和环境效益，以及它们的组成植物与土壤和邻近生境中的许多其他生物有机体之间相互作用的重要性。草原所提供的许多生态和环境效益源于植物物种的根与它们所生长的土壤之间的相互作用。我们回顾了有关草地生态系统在提供生态和环境效益方面的作用的当前知识。我们将考虑改良草地如何带来这些好处，以及植物育种改善特定性状的潜在机会，这些特殊性状将增强这些好处，同时又保持草料生产供牲畜食用。讨论了开发新的植物育种方法（包括高通量表型）和引入密切相关物种的性状的机会。