Data from: Joint ozone pollution and climate warming reduce yield but enhance grain protein content in a resistant wheat variety

Ozone (O3) pollution and climate warming jointly threaten crop
productivity and undermine global food security. However, their combined
effects on wheat under real-world conditions are not well understood,
limiting the potential for adaptation. Here, we investigated yield and
grain protein of a main wheat variety under joint elevated O3 and warming
manipulations in three years (2021-2023), using a real-world simulation
with a free-air controlled enrichment (FACE) facility. We found that O3
pollution reduced grain yield mainly by limiting the carbon source by
accelerating flag leaf senescence and declining leaf area index. Warming
enhanced nitrogen uptake before heading, which mitigates leaf senescence
and increases grain protein content. This main wheat variety shows less
variability in responses to independently elevated O3 and warming than
those varieties reported in previous literature. Cultivating this
resistant wheat variety reduced yield losses by only 6% under O3 pollution
and warming, while increasing grain nitrogen content by 9%. These findings
demonstrate that it is critical to breed wheat varieties that optimize
high yield in tandem with adaptation to air pollution and climate change.