section_path: Breeding objectives/To create hybrid vigor
section_name: To create hybrid vigor
paragraph_text: To create hybrid vigor
  
  Because wheat self-pollinates, creating hybrid seed to provide the possible benefits of heterosis, hybrid vigor (as in the familiar F1 hybrids of maize), is extremely labor-intensive; the high cost of hybrid wheat seed relative to its moderate benefits have kept farmers from adopting them widely despite nearly 90 years of effort. Commercial hybrid wheat seed has been produced using chemical hybridizing agents, plant growth regulators that selectively interfere with pollen development, or naturally occurring cytoplasmic male sterility systems. Hybrid wheat has been a limited commercial success in Europe (particularly France), the United States and South Africa.
  
  Synthetic hexaploids made by crossing the wild goatgrass wheat ancestor Aegilops tauschii, and other Aegilops, and various durum wheats are now being deployed, and these increase the genetic diversity of cultivated wheats.