News

NEWS

  • Wheat phenotyping workshop

    The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) extends a cordial invitation to participate in the training workshop "Wheat phenotyping for the identification of germplasm with high yield potential and tolerance to drought and heat". This will be held in CIMMYT HQ, Texcoco, State of Mexico, on September 28th, 2018 (from 9:00 – 14:00 hrs) as part of the II Plant Breeding Symposium México 2018 (https://trasmejoragen.wixsite.com/inicio) The objective of this workshop is to train participants in the phenotypic characterization of wheat germplasm. Research themes include: climate change; priority characteristics for wheat for Mexico; phenotyping of genetically diverse materials and in the ...

  • II Plant Breeding Symposium Mexico 2018

    MasAgro Biodiversity announces the II Plant Breeding Symposium Mexico 2018 which will be held on September 6 and 7, 2018 at the CIMMYT HQ, Texcoco. Mexico. This event belongs to the series of DuPont Plant Sciences Symposia. For more information please visit the website:https://trasmejoragen.wixsite.com/inicio

  • New video: Crop biodiversity for healthy, nutritious livelihoods

    Erratic weather, poor soil health, and resource shortages keep millions of maize and wheat farmers in developing countries from growing enough to feed their households and communities or to harvest a surplus to sell.

  • 3rd KDSmart app workshop

    The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) extends a cordial invitation to participate in the training workshop on the use of the KDSmart app. This will be held in Texcoco, State of Mexico, on December 20, 2017 (from 9:00 - 17:00 hrs).

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Catalogue

PRODUCTS CATALOGUE

PRODUCTS CATALOGUE

MasAgro Biodiversity, a component of the Sustainable Modernization of Traditional Agriculture (MasAgro) program, focuses on the utilization and conservation of valuable genetic resources with genetic diversity protected in germplasm banks. This program has the purpose of accelerating the development of Varieties of maize and wheat that can meet the nutrition and nutritional demands of a growing population, facing the challenges of climate change.

By characterizing the genetic configuration of CIMMYT germplasm bank collections, the evaluation of priority characteristics – such as drought tolerance, high temperatures and some diseases – and the development of bioinformatics tools that streamline its analysis, MasAgro Biodiversity has Generated a “platform for the utilization of genetic resources” of maize and wheat.

This platform puts several products at the disposal of the scientific community. MasAgro Biodiversity also offers some services in order to promote equity in access and benefits of the use of maize and wheat diversity.

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The CIMMYT germplasm bank is home to over 140,000 wheat and 28,000 maize samples that represent invaluable genetic diversity. To increase utilization of these materials for crop improvement, the Seeds of Discovery (SeeD) initiative uses cutting-edge genetic analysis technology to explore the diversity of the CIMMYT maize and wheat genebanks to identify useful, novel genetic diversity to introduce to breeding programs.

Cultivation of maize seedlings to sample leaves from 30 individuals per accession for DNA extraction (three accessions per tray). Photo: CIMMYT.

SeeD characterizes the genetic makeup of maize and wheat collections and bridging germplasm, through the high-end DNA sequencing technology of the Genetic Analysis Service for Agriculture (SAGA). By identifying molecular markers for maize and wheat varieties with specific gene forms, or alleles, associated to resistance to stresses such as drought, heat, pests and diseases, SeeD will help breeders develop the improved varieties farmers need to feed a growing population in a changing climate.

By mid-2016, approximately 100,000 wheat and 44,500 maize samples have been genotyped by the project, generating comprehensive datasets describing the genetic diversity of two of mankind’s major food crops. These datasets are being made publically available on the SeeD website, in Germinate and Dataverse, for use by researchers, students and anyone interested in working with genotypic data worldwide.

What is SAGA?

A researcher works to analyze and collect data from the HiSeq 2500 at SAGA. Photo: CIMMYT.

SAGA is a research and service laboratory that uses a genotyping platform based on the DArTseq method, developed to create genomic profiles of maize and wheat varieties. This technology is based on re-sequencing a small, well-defined fraction of the genome (a ‘genome representation’), corresponding to 0.1–1% of the genome. Genome representations are prepared using ‘complexity reduction’ methods that reproducibly select a well-defined subset of DNA loci (‘tags’) from the genome. Restriction enzymes (RE) based complexity-reduction methods separate low copy sequences (most informative for marker discovery and typing) from the repetitive fraction of the genome, making an advantageous selection of genome fraction corresponding predominantly to active genes.

The sequencer at SAGA can read up to 100,000 samples annually and generates large quantities of data at a comparatively low price. Located at CIMMYT headquarters outside of Mexico City, it is the only genotyping technology of its kind located in Mexico.

SAGA provides genotyping services to a number of national and international collaborators, including MasAgro, CIMMYT, ICARDA, INIFAP, private companies and universities. If you are interested in learning more about how SAGA could be utilized to support and enhance your research or your breeding program, please contact Dr. Carolina Sansaloni (c.sansaloni@cgiar.org) or Dr. Cesar Petroli (c.petroli@cgiar.org).

 

Large-scale wheat characterization trial at CIMMYT’s headquarters where one representative plant per accession was sampled for DNA extraction. Photo: CIMMYT.

 

SeeD also offers a number of publicly available resources to facilitate the visualization and analysis of data, including tools to help researchers better utilize and visualize the genotypic data produced by SAGA. In addition, the project offers training in this technology to Mexican researchers and students through courses and visits are offered each year.

SAGA is a partnership between CIMMYT and Mexico’s Ministry of agriculture and rural development (SADER) through the MasAgro (Sustainable Modernization of the Traditional Agriculture) project, with the support of a private company from Australia, Diversity Arrays Technology (DArT).

Research portfolio

For more information please contact us at: seed@masagro.org

RESEARCH PORTFOLIO

RESEARCH PORTFOLIO

Genetic resources

Genetic resources

Capacity

Capacity

Data

Data

Pre-breeding Germplasm

Pre-breeding Germplasm

Knowledge

Knowledge

Software

Software

PHILOSOPHY OF OUR APPROACH

PHILOSOPHY OF OUR APPROACH

So many accessions, so few data!

Many genebanks resemble libraries that lack sufficiently informative catalogs. The advent of next-generation DNA-sequencing platforms has made it possible to characterize the genetic diversity conserved in entire genebanks.

Information management

Generating new data by itself is insufficient if it cannot be effectively disseminated, queried, summarized, visualized, and analyzed. Data generation, therefore, has to go hand-in-hand with providing intuitive software and analysis tools to deal with the rapidly expanding datasets describing maize and wheat genetic resources.

Pre-breeding

A ‘reformatting’ of the diversity in genebanks into a more breeder-ready format could lower the barriers to mobilize novel genetic variation into breeding programs, which in good part are due to the dependency of gene effects on genetic backgrounds.

Traits with complex genetic architecture

Some of the most important challenges to agriculture need to be addressed by manipulating genetically complex characters controlled by small-effect alleles (yield potential, heat and drought tolerance, etc.).

Collecting germplasm.

The availability of sufficient numbers of genebank accessions does not appear to be a factor limiting the use of novel genetic variation in breeding programs, and a new initiative will secure the global network of genebanks of humanity’s major food crops for future generations.