Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90 Page 91 Page 92 Page 93 Page 94 Page 95 Page 96 Page 97 Page 98 Page 99 Page 100 Page 101 Page 102 Page 103 Page 104 Page 105 Page 106 Page 107 Page 108 Page 109 Page 110 Page 111 Page 112On the Edge For your convenience we now have scale on site for quick loading. We are ready to meet your needs. Give us a call to discuss what we can do to help you this spring. Performance Pedigreed Seed Farm Box 1363 Redwater, Alberta T0A 2W0 Chelsea Tomlinson Cell: (780) 777-5885 Oats CDC Ruffian AC Morgan CS Camden HR Wheat AAC Ellie AC Muchmore CDC Utmost CPS Wheat AAC Penhold Faba Beans Snowbird Yellow Peas CDC Amarillo AAC Lacombe To Cure Crop Disease Faster, Add Bugs Scientists might soon be able to transform wilting, diseased crops into healthy ones by releasing colonies of benign insects onto a field. Scientists at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the U.S. want to capitalize on insects’ natural relationships with plants. They believe the insects can transmit viruses carrying beneficial genetic traits to the plants they feed on. The agency wants to use an approach called gene therapy to protect and rejuvenate crops from diseases – both naturally occurring ones and biothreats. Scientists think insects, which are the natural carriers of most plant viruses, could shuttle defensive genes to crops. Insects can be quickly bred and released within the same growing season. DARPA is soliciting proposals from academic and industry scientists to develop a plant virus capable of carrying and delivering genetic material to a mature plant. Investigators will then have to figure out which insect species would deliver the viruses. Ideally, the technology could be used for important agricultural commodities, such as corn, wheat and soybeans. For now, the gene therapy experiments will be conducted in laboratories or other contained spaces. DARPA hopes the technology will be ready to be released in the field in four years. Accelerating Plant Breeding in Developing Countries Crop breeders in developing countries can now access free tools to accelerate the breeding of improved crops varieties, thanks to a collaboration between the GOBII project at Cornell University and the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI), and the James Hutton Institute in Scotland. The collaboration works with breeding centres around the world to identify unmet needs and has developed tools to make the process of adding a trait into an existing, high-yield crop variety more efficient. Researchers at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) are using the tools to develop corn varieties with greater resistance to viruses. Researchers at GOBII, the Genomic and Open-source Breeding Informatics Initiative, worked with developers from the Hutton Institute to build upon the existing data visualization application, Flapjack. Its new tools enable breeders to select the best possible parental lines and help users to perform marker-assisted backcrossing (MABC) – a process that involves repeated breeding with the high-yield parent to ensure that only the desired genes are transferred. Researchers estimate that they can cut a year or two from the four or five years required to develop a new variety. Previously, these types of molecular breeding tools only existed within biotech companies. But GOBII, a Cornell-led project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is tailoring these free tools for breeders in developing countries. They are building data management software in collaboration with the international crops research centers ICRISAT in India, CIMMYT in Mexico and IRRI in the Philippines. Michael Olsen, a molecular geneticist at CIMMYT, is test- driving the tools in his work to develop lines of corn that are resistant to maize lethal necrosis, a disease that has devastated corn crops in Kenya. Olsen’s research involves 43 separate breeding crosses, bred over five generations. The new tools help him to visualize the relevant genes and identify donor strains that are most likely to successfully interbreed. Next, GOBII will conduct training sessions for the tools at breeding centres in India, Africa, Mexico, the Philippines and at Cornell. The tools can be used to improve any trait in any crop plant. 108 www.seed.ab.ca | Advancing Seed in Alberta