{"id":1897,"date":"2019-01-18T17:27:55","date_gmt":"2019-01-18T09:27:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/?p=1897"},"modified":"2019-01-18T17:27:55","modified_gmt":"2019-01-18T09:27:55","slug":"wheat-breeders-get-cheat-sheet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/2019\/01\/18\/wheat-breeders-get-cheat-sheet\/","title":{"rendered":"Wheat breeders get a cheat sheet"},"content":{"rendered":"
Plant breeding is strictly a numbers game \u2014 but researchers have found a way to improve the odds with help from a new tool called a \u2018breeder chip.\u2019<\/div>\n
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\u201cBreeding is like a lottery. The more tickets you buy, the greater the chance of success,\u201d said Curtis Pozniak, a professor of plant sciences and wheat breeder at the University of Saskatchewan.<\/div>\n
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\u201cBut with a breeder chip, we now have the ability to improve our odds of identifying the very best genetics before they even hit the field.\u201d<\/p>\n
Developed as part of a 10-year-long project to sequence the wheat genome, the breeder chip uses more than 5,000 DNA markers from one end of the genome to the other to target specific genes. This information can then help plant breeders select for specific traits more accurately and predict the performance of individual breeding lines.<\/div>\n
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\u201cWe wanted to generate a blueprint of the wheat genome so that we have access to, and an understanding of, all the genes in wheat \u2014 the blueprint of what makes wheat wheat,\u201d said Pozniak, who is also co-chair of the Wheat Initiative, an international body that helps co-ordinate wheat research (including the International Wheat Genome Sequencing Consortium).<\/div>\n
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\u201cBut really, the idea behind generating the wheat genome was always to use that to develop tools that we can use as breeders to improve selection efficiency.\u201d<\/p>\n
Traditionally, plant breeders have used a small number of DNA markers to help select for traits such as disease resistance and quality. But Pozniak\u2019s team wanted to take that a step further, by using DNA markers for more complicated traits such as yield and fusarium head blight resistance.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThose traits tend to be much more complex, so we needed a different strategy to apply DNA testing to support selection for those,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen we have some traits that are difficult to tackle, having access to these technologies gives us one more tool in the tool box to deal with managing those.\u201d<\/div>\n
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But this breeder chip is only intended to supplement \u2014 not supplant \u2014 the work that plant breeders are already doing, he added.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThis isn\u2019t going to replace all the other tools and technologies that we\u2019ve been using as plant breeders,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just one more tool in the tool box, and like any good carpenter, we\u2019re going to be using the appropriate tool for the problem.\u201d<\/div>\n
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Plant breeders will still need to evaluate the genetic materials and test new varieties in the field, a process that can take upwards of 10 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cGenetics are only one component that\u2019s important to plant breeding. The other component is the environment that the plant is grown in, and that impacts how the plant will perform,\u201d said Pozniak.<\/div>\n
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\u201cSo we still need to measure that and understand how a variety performs across a range of environments. That\u2019s actually what takes the most time in breeding.\u201d<\/div>\n
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A quicker route<\/strong>\n<\/div>\n
While the breeder chip may not shorten the breeding process, it will make it more predictable. Right now, the plant-breeding process faces a key challenge \u2014 new genetics could go through the 10-year multi-generation field trial process and still not produce a viable variety.<\/div>\n
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The breeder chip will help reduce that risk.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThe chip is more useful in proving the reliability of our selections so that we\u2019re testing material in the fields that has the best possible chance of becoming a variety,\u201d said Pozniak.<\/div>\n
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Currently, plant breeders spend significant time evaluating the yield reliability of their materials in different nurseries and field plots across the Prairies, and then that process is repeated for a number of generations to ensure the variety is stable.<\/div>\n
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The breeder chip will complement that process \u201cso that the material that we put out in the field has the best chance to become a variety,\u201d said Pozniak. It will allow breeders to analyze their breeding materials, statistically predict their performance, make a selection based on that prediction, and then take the materials to the field for evaluation.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThe process is similar in the sense that breeders will still be taking materials to the field. But they\u2019ll be increasing their odds of identifying good materials with the breeder chip.\u201d<\/div>\n
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This type of genomic selection will also allow breeders to select for traits much earlier in the breeding process.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s impossible, for instance, to measure grain yield of a potential variety early in the breeding program simply because you don\u2019t have enough seed to plant across a whole bunch of different environments to evaluate yield,\u201d said Pozniak. \u201cBut with a DNA test, you can actually start selecting for those traits well before you were able to in the past.\u201d<\/div>\n
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While Pozniak\u2019s team is still in the early stages of evaluating the breeder chip, the results have been promising so far.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIt will take time to evaluate our progress, but what we are seeing is that the material that we\u2019re putting out in the field for some traits is better than it has been in the past.\u201d<\/div>\n
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Pozniak is also leading the 10+ Wheat Genomes Project, an international effort to sequence the genomes of even more wheat varieties from breeding programs around the world.<\/div>\n
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\u201cWe\u2019ve sequenced one wheat variety, but in order to really understand what makes one variety different from another at the DNA level, you need to be able to compare,\u201d said Pozniak.<\/div>\n
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\u201cNow we can start not just looking at the blueprints of one variety but the blueprints of many varieties so that we can understand what makes them different and what makes them better.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s a very exciting time for wheat.\u201d<\/div>\n
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That work is ongoing, he said. The team has completed the sequencing for 13 varieties from around the world (ensuring a high level of genetic diversity), and now it\u2019s starting to compare those varieties.<\/div>\n
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\u201cWe\u2019re seeing a tremendous amount of difference between varieties. Sometimes we\u2019ll see one variety that has more disease resistance than another,\u201d said Pozniak.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIf we knew the genetic basis for that difference, we might be able to select for it using DNA tests.\u201d<\/div>\n
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It may seem like a complex process to find out how wheat ticks, but the ultimate goal of both the genome sequencing project and the breeder chip is a simple one \u2014 to produce new and improved varieties for wheat growers.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThe whole point of breeding is applying whatever tools we can to develop new varieties for producers,\u201d said Pozniak. \u201cIn doing this, we\u2019re improving the efficiency of plant breeding, and that ultimately will result in improved varieties for producers.\u201d<\/div>\n
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Source<\/strong>:\u00a0Alberta Farm Express<\/a><\/span><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Plant breeding is strictly a numbers game \u2014 but researchers have found a way to improve the odds with help from a new tool called a \u2018breeder chip.\u2019 \u201cBreeding is like a lottery. The more tickets you buy, the greater the chance of success,\u201d said Curtis Pozniak, a professor of plant sciences and wheat breeder… Continue reading Wheat breeders get a cheat sheet<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-industry-news","entry"],"yoast_head":"\nWheat breeders get a cheat sheet - agrinoon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/2019\/01\/18\/wheat-breeders-get-cheat-sheet\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Wheat breeders get a cheat sheet - agrinoon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Plant breeding is strictly a numbers game \u2014 but researchers have found a way to improve the odds with help from a new tool called a \u2018breeder chip.\u2019 \u201cBreeding is like a lottery. 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