In the United States, over 70% of imported rice that currently makes up the 12% of domestic consumption is Jasmine, primarily from Thailand. Development of improved Jasmine-type cultivar with similar specialty characteristics (aroma, texture, and flavor) to those imports and with competitive grain and milling yields while adapted to the southern U.S. environment will help the rice industry access to such a fast growing and high value domestic niche market. Thai Jasmine rice belongs to Indica and has a low amylose content, high gelatinization consistency, low gelatinization temperature, and strong fragrance. In contrast, the U.S. long-grain rice that makes up over 90% of the rice acreage in the southern U.S. belongs to tropical Japonica and has high amylose content, intermediate gelatinization consistence and temperature, and no fragrance. These genetic, cereal chemical and specialty characteristic differences pose a great challenge for the development of adapted Jasmine-type rice cultivars by the incorporation of the specialty characteristics of Thai Jasmine rice into elite U.S. long-grain genotypes.

In this study, we attempted to define the main attributors of the Jasmine rice through the comparison of Jasmine rice with U.S. long-grain rices on cereal chemistry, grain appearance, cooking texture, and flavor. The genetic modes of these attributors were reviewed in detail. Different recombination schemes were proposed and compared to identify the most efficient ones to facilitate such a breeding effort. Those schemes include single crosses and backcrosses between Thai Jasmine variety (Khao Dawk Mali 105) and U.S. long-grain genotypes, intercrosses among improved Jasmine-type lines, and crosses involving U.S. specialty long-grain rices such as Della- and Toro-type genotypes.