Standardized Phenotyping

Goal: Define a list and format of descriptors for use in breeding and germplasm evaluations that are applicable across breeding programs/genera/subfamilies/families of Rosaceae. Categories of descriptors have been identified as high priority:

  • Disease Resistance
  • Fruit Quality
  • Productivity
  • Abiotic Stress Resistance

Background: With a shared ancestral genome, the details of which are beginning to come to light from structural and comparative genomics research, the possibility exists to discover common gene networks underlying traits of interest to crops of the Rosaceae family. Techniques in genomics and bioinformatics are rapidly expanding for such comparative efforts, and the bottleneck is now the availability of readily comparable phenotypic data. Standardized phenotyping can be as “simple” as aligning data collection methods for a crop between two research locations, or between a breeding program and a genomics research study. It is more difficult to obtain phenotypic data for two different crops, particularly across subfamilies, that have the likelihood of being under common genetic control. Achieving this goal, however, holds the promise of strengthening Rosaceae-wide ties between breeding programs, germplasm collections, and genetics and genomics research.

Desirable characteristics of new/modified descriptors

  • Heritable
  • Easy to measure (time, cost logistics)
  • Relevant to breeding programs (value to industry)
  • Relevant to Research programs(biological basis for genomics and genetics studies)
  • Objective data that can be collected uniformly across locations/time
  • If subjective data, then include information on confidence level.
  • Identify a set of reference accessions available internationally

Background Information:

Discussion Groups held to discuss Rosaceae phenotypic descriptors

Outcomes

  • Recommend a list of priority descriptors and subsets of germplasm
  • Coordinated phenotyping efforts
  • Make data accessible via databases

Phenotype Descriptors

Primary Contacts