The University of Alberta wheat breeding program has registered and commercialized 13 CWRS varieties and one CPS variety since 2013. Sixteen MSc. students (13 graduated); 17 PhD students (14 graduated); 6 Post-Doctoral Fellows; and 3 Visiting Scientists have been involved with the program since 2002. These graduates are working as scientists, biologists, researchers and professors in Alberta, western Canada and globally. The program has published over 130 refereed scientific articles in that time as well.
Read MoreThere is a large amount of economic literature that examines return to investments in public agricultural research in breeding. The predominance of evidence suggests the rate to return to public agricultural research is persistently high across a large number of agricultural subsectors, jurisdictions, and time periods. In Western Canada, there are several studies, including those we have been involved with, that show very high internal rates of return of investments in agricultural applied research and breeding. These returns are easily verified with simple calculations looking at the gross annual research benefit and weighted average increases over time.
Read MoreThis research will assess if there may be an opportunity to extend the crop harvest beyond the grain to include some portion of the crop residues, without appreciably impairing soil health. Most field studies to investigate the effects of crop residue exports on agroecosystem performance and soil status run for fewer than 10, and often for only 3 yrs. Such short time spans often are too small to appreciably alter C or nitrogen (N) cycling. This project will take advantage of a simple residue manipulation experiment that has been maintained for 20 years at AAFC Lethbridge.
Read MoreWe aim to address the wireworm problem in wheat by developing RNAi as a tool for wireworm suppression. RNAi has the potential to be powerful, targeted, and environmentally friendly and has been shown to have efficacy against over 20 insect crop pests. We will approach our RNAi goal for wireworm control from two angles. First is to develop a seed treatment where double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) will be used to target specific wireworm genes for down-regulation and then create Canola plants expressing RNAi targeted to specific wireworm genes and to use these plants as a "clean up" rotation crop.
Read MoreGrowers should be provided with tools to make informed decisions and select appropriate drying strategies to minimize spoilage risk, ensure timely and uniform drying with optimum quality, and high energy efficiency. In-bin natural air drying, high temperature drying and combination drying will be investigated. The purpose is to develop wheat storage and handling guidelines for Alberta climatic conditions for increased energy efficiency, timely and uniform drying and optimum milling and baking quality of dried wheat. These storage and handling guidelines will be also useful in postharvest preservation of other major cereal grains, oil seeds and pulses.
Read MoreWe will utilize our Pst collection to generate pools of molecular markers for the Pst in Canada to be applied as a fast approach to predict pathogen changes/incursions. In parallel (lead by Dr. Ragupathy), resistance associated markers from Canadian wheat panel of 250 spring wheat and Triticum accessions that has been already genotyped by Dr. Cloutier (AAFC Ottawa, a collaborator) and ~200 winter durum wheat panel available in Dr. Ragupathy’s lab will be also utilized. The project is expected to generate useful tool to track rust changes in Canada, and identify resistance in already genotyped elite lines.
Read MoreWe aim to integrate long-term data on management, soils, crops, and weather to provide a holistic view of how changes in management impact soils over time, and how these changes in "soil health" could buffer the cropping system and alleviate the impact of future perturbations. Our research questions include: (1) Do farming practices deemed to "invest in soil health" pay off over short- and long-term timescales in the semi-arid Canadian prairies? (2) If so, how can farmers invest in soil health while maintaining profitability and stability under a changing climate?
Read MoreThe objective of implementing a threshold for weed seed production is to reduce the spread of herbicide-resistant weed biotypes. Understanding the timing of weed life cycle events (phenology) can improve the efficiency of weed control passes by informing growers of the optimal timing for weed control efforts. This research project aims to improve our understanding of weed phenology in western Canada, and in particular the phenology of weed seed production; an area of research which has been largely ignored.
Read MoreBreeding for biotic stress like stripe rust is an on-going challenge due to the continuous emergence of newly adapted races. The proposed research aims to translate the research findings of a recently concluded upstream research project where novel genetic sources of resistance against pathogens including stripe rust have been identified using the novel RenSeq method, in a diversity panel of intermediate wheatgrass accessions.
Read MoreThis project aims to develop a decision support tool to aid producers in determining what products would constitute MEMOA for target weeds in their field. In addition a second tool would be developed to help identify the potential risk of herbicide resistance evolving based on a four year crop rotation and the resulting herbicide choices. A tool of this type has been created for Wyoming and Nebraska.
Read MoreThe overall goal of the proposed research is to optimize arbuscular mycorrhizae inoculation potential and subsequent nitrogen use efficiency in cereal crops. This research will provide valuable agronomic knowledge that will enable producers to be more efficient in the application of nitrogen fertilizers and validate the efficacy of AMF inoculation in conjunction with common pesticides used in Canadian cereal crops.
Read MoreField surveys on the Canadian Prairies have reported that 69% of fields sampled for wild oats contain wild oats with some level of herbicide resistance. The project involves a multi-faceted approach to addressing the resistance issue. Funding for a part-time manager is requested to coordinate a number of activities including developing inventory of past and current research on wild oat biology and management, a voluntary producer testing program to increase awareness and an extension and awareness program.
Read MoreNearly all barley cultivars (including the most popular ones) in western Canada have poorer resistance than the moderately resistant checks. The current proposal targets all three aforementioned diseases of wheat and barley for characterization of the pathogen populations as well as identification of novel sources of resistance. The ultimate goal of the proposal is to generate information for wheat geneticists and breeders in western Canada, which will help them breed for resistance.
Read MoreCPSR breeding should be accelerated in order to keep pace with growing global demand and to maintain yield advantage. Genomic Selection (GS) is a molecular breeding tool that facilitates the selection of lines with genotypic information available only through prediction models constructed based on a training population. It is a streamlined method for early generation selection that accelerates cultivar development through shorter breeding cycles.
Read MoreWireworm is a serious pest for many growers, and on the Prairies is a unique mix of 3-4 dominant species. The damaging larvae live for several years in the soil, feed on multiple crops, and have patchy distributions. For these reasons wireworm is difficult to monitor, and no economic thresholds are currently available. As new (possible more effective) chemical seed treatments enter the marketplace, a glaring need exists for a decision-making framework for wireworm management. We will investigate to give producers information before using pesticides.
Read MoreEcological principles can be applied to agricultural practices to replace agrochemicals and increase productivity by implementing either species diversity e.g. mixed cropping or genetic diversity within species e.g. varietal mixture (VM). VM of several cultivars which belongs to the same market class and exhibit a similar quality profile but variable levels of pest resistance, drought tolerance and yield potential can be successfully implemented in large scale mechanized farming systems.
Read MoreThe proposed research into wheat and triticale that can fix atmospheric N2 for their own needs would increase cereal crop productivity in nitrogen-deficient soils and enhance sustainability of system management practices in agriculture by reducing the amount of N fertilizer application, thus saving both money and the environment. The proposed project aims at generation of triticale and wheat varieties with stable trait of Biological Nitrogen Fixation, by genetic engineering of crop plant mitochondrial genomes with the nitrogen fixation genes originating from BNF bacteria.
Read MoreThe present proposal combines the results of previous studies to determine optimal varietal choice and planting time; employing early- and late- planting with early- and late- maturing cultivars presently available to western Canadian wheat growers. This will aid in refining best management practices for optimal yield and harvest quality (including protein and falling number) for hard red spring wheat production in western Canada.
Read MoreThis project builds on the ongoing project co-funded by Sask Wheat on Fusarium Head Blight (FHB) resistance to fungicide, in which a Nested Association Mapping population for F. graminearum (FgNAM) was developed by crossing between eight isolates of Fusarium mostly from Saskatchewan and Manitoba and, a high-quality genome assembly have been generated. This population segregates for multiple traits including aggressiveness (quantitative variation of pathogenicity), deoxynivalenol (DON) chemotype (15ADON vs. 3ADON) and concentration and sensitivity to triazole fungicides.
Read MoreThis project focuses on developing CWRS wheat cultivars that are 10-15% higher yielding while meeting protein and baking quality targets. Some genes seem to be promising, as they are associated with improvements in grain protein content as well as in baking quality parameters, without any apparent negative effects on grain yield. The inclusion of these genes has been shown to have additional benefits such as balanced dough properties, increased mineral levels, and improved stripe rust resistance.
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