Breeding new crop cultivars for adaptation to stress-related phenomena due to soil chemical toxicity and deficiency is a complex process. Data from nutrient culture trials, in which seedling plants are stressed with a deficiency or excess of mineral elements, do not correlate well with those from similar field stress conditions using the same germplasm. Further, evaluating segregating populations in nutrient culture can result in little or no genetic gain due to selection. Field screening efforts are plagued with genotype x environmental interactions caused by a multitude of biotic and abiotic factors. Selecting the proper level of stress for field evaluations and maintaining this level in a dynamically changeable medium like soil can be difficult. Genetic improvement of sorghum under field conditions similar to those encountered by farmers, however, has nearly always been obtained
