Cultivar · Durum wheat cultivar
Kronos
Kronos is a United States durum wheat, grown as irrigated Desert Durum, that has become the standard tetraploid reference genotype in wheat genetics through a sequenced TILLING mutant population used to study gene function.
Record
Cultivar / variety- Variety of
- Wheat
- Botanical taxon
- Triticum turgidum subsp. durum
- Type
- Cultivar
- Breeding method
- Cross-breeding (pedigree selection)
- Origin
- United States
- Registry status
- Historical · as of 2026-07-12
- Adaptation
- Grown as irrigated "Desert Durum" in the hot, arid conditions of the southwestern United States.
- Intended use
- Durum wheat for semolina and pasta, Widely used tetraploid reference genotype in wheat genetics (TILLING) research
Registry listing or variety protection is jurisdiction- and date-specific and does not by itself indicate current commercial availability, universal cultivation approval, patent status, or a recommendation.
Kronos is a durum wheat (Triticum turgidum subsp. durum) grown in the United States, where durum of this type is produced as irrigated "Desert Durum" in the hot, arid southwest. Like other durum wheats it yields hard, amber grain used to make semolina for pasta.
Kronos is best known in research as the tetraploid counterpart to the bread wheat Cadenza: a large chemically mutagenized (EMS) TILLING population was created in Kronos and had its exome sequenced, giving scientists a way to find mutations in individual durum-wheat genes. This resource was developed by a collaboration among US and UK research institutes.
Origin and classification
- Species
- Triticum turgidum subsp. durum (tetraploid durum wheat)
- Origin
- United States (grown as irrigated Desert Durum)
- Growth habit
- Spring
- End use
- Semolina for pasta
Use in research
Kronos is widely used as a durum reference genotype in wheat functional genomics. A TILLING population — a collection of lines each carrying many chemically induced point mutations — was generated in Kronos and had its exome sequenced, allowing researchers to identify lines mutated in a chosen gene. Together with the hexaploid cultivar Cadenza, Kronos underpins a large part of publicly available wheat mutant resources.
Official variety registration
Entries recorded for this denomination in official variety registers. Registration is a legal fact about marketing or ownership, separate from where the variety is grown or whether seed is available.
No entry for this cultivar is currently listed in the registers AgricultureID reads.
Entries that are no longer current
Each register decides separately, so these are grouped by instrument and jurisdiction and never combined into one timeline.
GreeceNational list entry
- Observed 2026-08-27Surrendereddate not published by the sourceThe EU Plant Variety Portal — national list entry records this entry as “Surrendered” and publishes no date for the change.
- These registers publish a grant or listing date but no date for an entry ceasing to be current, so when this ended is not established here.
AustraliaPlant breeder’s right
- Observed 2026-08-27WITHDRAWNdate not published by the sourceThe Australian Plant Breeder's Rights records this entry as “WITHDRAWN” and publishes no date for the change.
- These registers publish a grant or listing date but no date for an entry ceasing to be current, so when this ended is not established here.
United StatesCertificate of plant variety protection
- Observed 2026-08-27Certificate Expireddate not published by the sourceGranted 1996-06-28. The United States Plant Variety Protection now records this entry as “Certificate Expired” and publishes no date for the change.
- These registers publish a grant or listing date but no date for an entry ceasing to be current, so when this ended is not established here.
History records what an official source published at a point in time. Where the source states the date a change took effect, that date is shown; where it does not, only the date AgricultureID observed the change is shown, and it is labelled as such.
Each history is specific to one jurisdiction and one legal instrument. A right that expired in one country says nothing about a listing in another, and they are never combined.
A variety registration permits marketing; a plant variety protection right is ownership. They are granted by different bodies under different law and are never added together.
Entries are matched to this cultivar by identical denomination and by matching botanical species. Registers do not publish a global variety identifier, so a same-name entry in the same species could in principle be a distinct variety.
Registration is jurisdiction-specific, is granted under a particular legal instrument, and changes. A variety absent from a register may still be grown; confirm the current position with the responsible authority before acting on it. How registration is recorded.
Relationships
Evidence-backed connections in the knowledge graph.
Adapted to climate
Scope & limitations
Geographic scope: Documented United States durum wheat used internationally as a tetraploid wheat genetics reference; agronomic adaptation is region- and season-specific.
Climate context: A durum wheat grown as irrigated Desert Durum in hot, arid regions and used widely as a research genotype.
- Adaptation and trait notes are region- and season-specific, and performance varies by environment.
- No release year or breeder is asserted here because reliable details were not confirmed; Kronos is described mainly through its documented use as a durum research reference genotype.
Sources
This article draws on the following authoritative sources. See our sources & methodology for how they are selected.
- High
Cited for: Classification of Triticum turgidum subsp. durum and Kronos exome/sequence resources
- Type:
- Reference database
- Jurisdiction:
- Global
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12
- [2]USDA ARS — Agricultural Research Service (opens in a new tab)Authoritative
USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS)
Cited for: United States durum wheat research context
- Type:
- Government agency
- Jurisdiction:
- United States
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12