Greenhouse gas (GHG) production during ensiling not only causes the nutrient losses of silage but also promotes climate warming.  However, there is little information on the production of GHG and strategies for mitigating GHG emissions during ensiling.  This work aimed to study the gas production characteristics and techniques for reducing gas emissions during ensiling.  Oats and triticale, with Lactiplantibacillus plantarum (LP) or corn meal (CM) addition, were ensiled.  The cumulative gas volume rapidly increased and reached to the peak within the first 9 d of ensiling for both forage crops.  The highest cumulative gas volume of triticale silage was twice as much as that of oats silage.  Triticale silage produced lower carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentration, higher methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O) concentrations than oats silage within the 28 d of ensiling.  Adding LP or CM significantly improved the fermentation quality and decreased the gas volume and GHG concentrations of 2 silages on d 56 (except CH₄ of triticale).  At the early stage of ensiling, more Enterobacter, Lactococcus and Leuconostoc related to gas production were observed, and adding LP increased the abundance of Lactobacillus and decreased the abundance of bacteria like Kosakonia, Pantoea, Enterobacter and Lactococcus positively correlated with gas volume, CO₂ and N₂O concentrations.  These results suggest that gas formation during ensiling mainly occurs in the first 9 d.  Adding LP or CM can significantly improve the fermentation quality and decrease the gas volume.  This would benefit to reducing GHG emissions in silage production.

Cotton is an important natural fiber crop worldwide which plays a vital role in our daily life.  High yield is a constant goal of cotton breeding, and lint percentage (LP) is one of the important components of cotton fiber yield.  A stable QTL controlling LP, qLP_A01.1, was identified on chromosome A01 from Gossypium hirsutum introgressed lines with G. tomentosum chromosome segments in a previous study.  To fine-map qLP_A01.1, an F₂ population with 986 individuals was established by crossing G. hirsutum cultivar CCRI35 with the chromosome segment substitution line HT_390.  A high-resolution genetic map including 47 loci and spanning 56.98 cM was constructed in the QTL region, and qLP_A01.1 was ultimately mapped into an interval corresponding to an ~80 kb genome region of chromosome A01 in the reference genome, which contained six annotated genes.  Transcriptome data and sequence analysis revealed that S-acyltransferase protein 24 (GoPAT24) might be the target gene of qLP_A01.1.  This result provides the basis for cotton fiber yield improvement via marker-assisted selection (MAS) and further studies on the mechanism of cotton fiber development.