- Genomic variation in tomato, from wild ancestors to contemporary breeding accessions. A first domestication in South America, a second step in Mesoamerica, occasional hybridization in the wild, differentiation through human selection. Some Ecuadorian and Peruvian diversity still unexplored for breeding.
- Characterization of a collection of local varieties of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) using conventional descriptors and the high-throughput phenomics tool Tomato Analyzer. Instant gratification comes to tomato characterization.
- Molecular diversity and genetic structure of 380 sweetpotato accessions as revealed by SSR markers. Also a two-step domestication history? What are the odds?
- Association of SSR markers with contents of fatty acids in olive oil and genetic diversity analysis of an olive core collection. Let the molecular-assisted breeding begin.
- Genetic Evaluation of Nutritional and Fodder Quality of Different Bamboo Species. Remarkably, some species are ok.
- Genetic Diversity Among the Microorganisms in Daqu Used for Beidacang Liquor as Revealed by RAPD Analyses. Well that’s a new one on me, but it’s good to have the data.
- Farm animal genetic and genomic resources from an agroecological perspective. If you’re going to really be ecological in your management of livestock genetic resources, you need to factor in ecosystem services, and figure out how genomic tools are going to help you. Well, that pretty much goes for crops too, surely.
- The labor of agrodiversity in a Moroccan oasis. Not all agrobiodiversity is that old.
- Identification of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) germplasm with unique popping quality in the national genebank collections of India. Amazing what you can find in genebanks.
- Iniadi pearl millet germplasm as a valuable genetic resource for high grain iron. See what I mean?
All sweetpotatoes are transgenic
Tina Kyndta and collaborators 1 have found that all cultivated sweetpotatoes are naturally transgenic because they contain transfer DNA (T-DNA) sequences from Agrobacterium. Gene-transfer via Agrobacterium is a naturally occurring process, that is used to make genetically modified crops in the lab. We did not know that one of our main food crops was once naturally transformed via the same process.
Kyndta et al. did not find any T-DNA in the wild relatives of sweetpotato, suggesting that the transformation(s) provided a beneficial trait that was selected for during domestication. The introduced genes are intact and expressed in different organs of the “Huachano” variety that they studied in detail, but we’ll have to wait for future expression studies to find out about the benefit of these paleo-GMOs.
The authors also suggest that, as people have been eating these swollen roots for millennia, we might now consider all transgenic crops to be “natural”. I don’t know about that. Didn’t most of these people suffer and die young? I predict that sweetpotato consumption will plummet now that the word is out.
Spreading the good genebank news
As I suspected, that “genebanks as morgues” slide that was shown yesterday at the Monogram 2015 meeting at Rothamstead, 2 and was tweeted at the time, was but a rhetorical gambit, a way of framing an argument to the opposite effect. That argument was that thanks to recent advances in genomics and bioinformatics, genebanks are in fact alive and kicking, and more used — and useful — than ever. As indeed is being shown by the subject of the presentation in question, the Seeds of Discovery project at CIMMYT. I’m glad that’s settled.
But it is interesting to ponder the power — and danger — of rhetorical devices, in an era of 140-character textbites. I mean, it’s a perfectly valid strategy in a fifteen-minute presentation to develop the argument that genebanks are being assiduously mined by breeders for all kinds of useful alleles by opening with the admittedly occasionally-voiced accusation that they are nothing but museums — or worse, morgues. I confess I may well have used such a strategy myself, on occasion. It is a potent way of getting the audience’s attention.
But you do need those subsequent fourteen minutes to make the case, and those in your audience who are so inclined may well remember, and repeat, the accusation more readily and forcefully than the clinching counter-argument. Some, indeed, may start to wonder whether genebanks were basically moribund in the past, and have been brought back from the brink by things like high-throughput genotyping and the associated bioinformatics. Gene-jockeys to the rescue! Whereas in fact breeders have been using genebanks since they began, just in different ways, and must have found them useful, or how would they have survivedY No doubt in twenty years’ time, the way we make use of genebanks now will make them look like intensive care wards. And goodness knows how many characters we’ll have at our disposal to talk about it.
Good news from the Nepalese national genebank
We have received news from various people working at the National Agriculture Genetic Resources Center of Nepal, the country’s national genebank, that the staff are all fine and the building suffered only minor damage.
Nepal is in many ways a pioneer in the development of community seedbanks, linked to participatory plant breeding, and the back-up, support and leadership provided by the national genebank is an integral and vital part of the joined-up system of crop diversity conservation that is emerging in that country.
Long may it continue to serve as an example to others.
Countdown finally starts to the end of Expo Milano 2015
I’ve been hoping I could get away with not mentioning Expo Milano 2015, with its ugly logo and eccentric website content. But it’s about feeding the world, it says here. And everybody’s going. So here goes, I’ve succumbed. But I’m not proud of it.