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).

Read more

New videos of Seed of Discovery Videos
masagro
sagarpa



cimmyt

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.

Read more

A broader and more efficient use of genetic resources in breeding programs is a key intervention point for producing more food with fewer inputs on essentially the same land as today.

Mexico is the center of origin of several important crops including maize, common bean, tomato, pumpkin, pepper, papaya, cocoa and guava, and is one of 17 mega-diverse countries that jointly harbor 70% of the world’s biodiversity. The country hosts some of the world’s largest genetic-resources collections of two of mankind’s three principal staple crops (maize and wheat), including the large maize and wheat collections held in trust by CIMMYT under an agreement with the FAO, and a well-documented collection of maize landraces recently funded by the National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity (CONABIO).

Mexico is therefore well positioned to play an important role in mobilizing underutilized genetic variation into breeding programs for the benefit of global food security and national food sovereignty. Yet a recent report shows that 60% of the 2,000 scientists involved in genetic-resources research in Mexico have received no formal training in the field. Mexico’s Plant Genetics Society (SOMEFI), in its National Action Plan for the Conservation of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, proposed, in 2006, the creation of a nation-wide postgraduate program focusing on genetic resources for food and agriculture.

There are currently 15 postgraduate programs in Mexico offering training in a variety of genetic resources-related matters. Many of these programs focus on the conservation of genetic resources. SeeD, with its emphasis on “characterization for use” seems well positioned to complement these programs by:

  • Contributing an applied, molecular-breeding perspective,
  • Taking advantage of the large datasets generated by SeeD participants as a source for data mining by students, and
  • Providing cutting-edge tools and services in support of germplasm characterization and utilization efforts.

SeeD, therefore, will attempt to re-invigorate the idea of establishing a world-class Mexican postgraduate program in this area, in consultation and collaboration with other interested parties.

Information management and services

 

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.