LONDON, AUG 27
British scientists have decoded the genome of wheat, in a breakthrough research that will prove valuable to crop breeders in increasing the yield of the staple food crop in countries like India.
Wheat production worldwide is under threat from climate change at a time when there is an increase in demand from a growing human population.
Scientists at the University of Liverpool, in collaboration with the University of Bristol and the John Innes Centre, have sequenced the entire wheat genome and will make the DNA data available to crop breeders to help them select key agricultural traits for breeding.
Bread wheat, with an estimated world harvest of more than 550 million tonnes, is one of the most important food crops in the world and is worth more than 2 billion pounds to the UK’s agricultural industry.
Wheat breeders, however, had few genetic tools to help them select key agricultural traits for breeding and do not always know the genes responsible for the trait they need.
Now, scientists have analysed the wheat genome, which is five times larger than the human genome and the largest genome to be sequenced till date, to give breeders the tools required to select traits for a healthy yield.
Professor Neil Hall, from the Institute of Integrative Biology, explains: “Sequencing the human genome took 15 years to complete, but with huge advances in DNA technology, the wheat genome took only a year”.
“The information we have collected will be invaluable in tackling the problem of global food shortage.
“We are now working to analyse the sequence to highlight natural genetic variation between wheat types, which will help significantly speed up current breeding programmes”.
The project, funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), was undertaken at the University’s Centre for Genomic Research.
