GrainGenes

MINUTES OF THE NATIONAL WHEAT IMPROVEMENT COMMITTEE (NWIC) MEETING

13 January, 2006.
San Diego, CA, USA.

Attendance.

NWIC members and Proxies: Allan Fritz, Brett Carver, Jim Peterson (Chair), Jim Anderson, Harold Bockelman, Joe Anderson, Xianming Chen, Kim Garland Campbell, Robert Graybosch (Secretary), Ruth Dill-Macky, Marty Carson, David Marshall, Yue Jin, John Burns, Jackie Rudd, Ben Edge, Luther Talbert, and Kay Simmons (ad hoc).

Guests: Ann Marie Thro, Ed Kaleikau, Guihua Bai, Dave Matthews, Jeff Entman, Floyd Dowell, Mike Davis, Rollin Sears, Gina Brown-Guedira, Victoria Carollo, Jorge Dubcovsky, others.

Approval of minutes. Minutes from the January 2005 meeting, as published in the Annual Wheat Newsletter, were approved without revision.

 

Increased funding for wheat research included in U.S. FY2006 budget.

Jim Peterson. The U.S. government provided additional funding for the following wheat/barley research projects in 2006:

a. National Stripe Rust Initiative, $500,000.
b. Regional Small Grain Genotyping Centers
i. $178,000 Raleigh
ii. $150,000 Manhattan
iii. $175, 000 Pullman (New funding via Stripe Rust Initiative)
c. Karnal bunt research , Manhattan, KS, $80,000
d. BYDV, West Layfatte, IN, $75,000
e. Genetic Resource Enhancement, Aberdeen, ID, $100,000
f. Cereal Crops Unit, Madison, WI, $250,000
g. ARS Buildings and Facilities
i. Plant Biosciences, Pullman ­ $3.625 M
ii. Ag Res Center, Fargo, $3.7M for plan and design
h. Other USDA items:
i. USDA­ARS Request for emergency action and funding to initiate stem rust screening in Kenya:1-yr temporary funding of $180,000, 2nd year of funding has been allocated
ii. USDA­CSREES Special Research Grants
1. Managing Karnal Bunt of wheat - $260K

 

Update on USDA-ARS positions and activities.

Kay Walker Simmons. ARS continues support of existing and new research activities, both within ARS and in partnership with State Agricultural Experiment Stations. Highlighted activities included the Wheat Scab Initiative, the Wheat Rust Initiative, newly initiated stem rust screening nursery in Kenya (cooperative with CIMMYT). ARS mandated a budget recession in 2006 to set aside funds for reconstruction of facilities destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. External reviews of USDA-ARS National Programs 301, 302, and 303 (http://www.ars.usda.gov/research/programs.htm) were conducted in 2005).

 

U.S. Plant Breeding Coordination Committee, USDA-CSREES-NRI.

Ann Marie Thro and Ed Kaleikau USDA-CSREES. Establishment of the U.S. Plant Breeding Coordination Committee (http://www.csrees.usda.gov/nea/plants/in_focus/ptbreeding_if_multistate.html) was described. The committee has the goal of establishing national goals in plant breeding. CSREES is supporting the wheat and barley CAP grants (http://maswheat.ucdavis.edu/Meetings/CAP2005/).

 

National Barley Improvement Committee/American Malting Barley Association report.

Mike Davis. Scab continues to have a major impact on malting barley quality in the U.S. Trade barriers and energy prices also are exerting negative effects on the domestic barley industry. The NBIC and AMBA remain supportive of all U.S. wheat research activities.

 

Update on activities of the Wheat Crop Germplasm Committee.

Kim Garland Campbell. The Wheat CGC met on January 12th. More than 400 new PI numbers were added to the USDA-ARS-NSGC, housed at Aberdeen, ID, during 2005. Regional nursery entries are under-represented. Breeders submitting materials to the USDA-ARS coördinated regional performance nurseries are encouraged to submit these materials to the Small Grains Collection. Additional items may be found in the minutes published elsewhere in the AWN.

 

Wheat CAP (Coordinated Agricultural Project) on wheat translational genomics.

Jorge Dubcovsky. The Wheat CAP grant program, a multi-state project aimed at the integration of functional genomics and wheat breeding, was funded by a USDA-CSREES-NRI grant. Activities were initiated with a coordination meeting held at the PAG meeting in January, 2006. For additional information see: http://maswheat.ucdavis.edu/Meetings/CAP2005/.

 

National Association of Wheat Growers.

Jeff Entman. NAWG has expressed concern over the future of wheat biotechnology and the continued loss of wheat acreage in the U.S. NAWG will meet with U.S. Wheat to discuss these issues.

 

Regional reports.

Hard winter wheat region. Brett Carver. Stripe rust was deemed responsible for an estimated 5­15% production loss in the region in 2005. Hessian fly has been increasing in importance as a pest, especially in Oklahoma and Kansas. Dr. Okky Chung has retired from her position as director of the Hard Wheat Quality Laboratory in Manhattan, KS, and a search for replacement is underway. Dr. Gina Brown-Guedira departed from the USDA­ARS at Manhattan, KS, to assume the position of director of the Small Grains Genotyping Laboratory at Raleigh, NC. Replacement of the position at Manhattan is anticipated.

Spring wheat region. Marty Carson/Yue Jin. Fusarium head blight and leaf rust continue to plague producers in the region. Construction of an addition to the Cereal Disease Laboratory in St. Paul, MN, has been completed and the facility will be commissioned shortly. Jeffrey Stein has assumed the position of Small Grains Pathologist at South Dakota State University.

Eastern soft wheat region. Dave Marshall/Joe Anderson. Stripe rust now is a recurring rather than periodic problem in wheat production in the southern and eastern U.S. Meera Kweon has assumed a position as Research Food Technologist, and Edward Souza has been appointed Research Leader at the USDA­ARS Soft Wheat Quality Laboratory at Wooster, OH.

Pacific Northwest region. Kim Garland Campbell/ Xianming Chen. Stripe rust now is common in 35 states, now present in locations from which historically it has been absent. Dr. Chen provided an update on stripe rust screening activities, now benefiting breeding programs throughout North America. The wheat crop in the PNW now contains large plantings of wheat cultivars incorporating Clearfield® technology. Dr. Mike Flowers joined the Oregon State University Department of Crop and Soil Science as an Extension Cereal agronomist.

 

CIMMYT/NWIC interactions.

Jim Peterson. The NWIC contacted the US Agency for International Development expressing the concern of U.S. wheat researchers regarding staffing reductions and impact of budget reductions on the scope of the CIMMYT wheat research activities. A positive response to the concern was received from AID. NWIC and CIMMYT co-sponsored a pre-conference workshop at the International Wheat Workers convention in Argentina, primarily to discuss joint activities on the control of Fusarium head blight, stripe and stem rust.

 

GrainGenes (http://wheat.pw.usda.gov/GG2/index.shtml).

Victoria Carollo. Current curator roles at GrainGenes are held by Dave Matthews, wheat maps, ancillary databases and projects, collaboration with Gramene; Victoria Carollo, barley maps, references, QTL, plant ontology, outreach; and Gerard Lazo, rye and oat maps, bioinformatics. Conversion to a relational database has been completed. Current projects under development include a web page to track stem rust race Ug99, SNP reports, and a complete collection of Triticeae QTL (in collaboration with Gramene). New wheat maps for 2005 include:

a. BAC contigs from the D genome.
b. Quality QTLs in the ITMI Synthetic X Opata population.
c. Wheat, Grandin X BR34 map.
d. QTL for wheat spindle streak mosaic virus resistance.
e. Wheat physical/genetic integration map.
f. Wheat physical SSR map.
g. 1DS, Ae. tauschii AUS X CPI highly recombinogenic regions at seed storage protein loci on 1DS.
h. 1DS Ae. tauschii RGA markers linked to Lr21.
i. 3A, SxY, QTL milling yield, Schomburgk X Yarralinka population.

 

Small Grains Genotyping Laboratories.

Guihua Bai, Gina Brown-Guedira, Kim Garland Campbell, and Jim Anderson provided updates on status and activities of the four USDA-ARS Regional Small Grains Genotyping laboratories. For additional information see:

a. http://www.cropsci.ncsu.edu/sggenotyping/

b. http://www.ars.usda.gov/Research/docs.htm?docid=9899

 

Other USDA-ARS informational items.

Floyd Dowell, Engineering Research Unit, USDA- ARS Grain Marketing and Production Research Center presented an update on "Applications of Single Kernel Sorting to Breeding Programs" and described the status of his laboratory and research unit.

USDA-ARS Regional Wheat Quality Laboratories, and their need for additional resources and financial resources, were discussed. NWIC remains supportive of these laboratories.

Harold Bockelman, USDA-ARS, Aberdeen, ID, described the need for a position at Aberdeen that would utilize molecular technologies in the characterization of materials housed in the USDA-ARS National Small Grains Collection.

Rust initiatives. Kay Walker Simmons, Jim Peterson, Yue Jin, X. Chen, and others. The initiation of a Global Rust Initiative (http://www.globalrust.org/), with seed funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, was described. Yue Jin stressed the need to extend stem rust screening beyond USDA­ARS regional nursery entries and to start evaluating earlier generation materials from breeding programs. Funding for the U.S. stripe rust initiative was approved for FY2005. A steering committee was appointed, with members being: Jim Peterson, Dave Marshall, K. Garland Campbell, Pat Hays, and X. Chen. The need was discussed for a new, comprehensive Cereal Rust Initiative. The initiative should support research on epidemiology, gene pyramiding, and adult plant resistance. Allan Fritz, Kansas State University, moved the NWIC support the "Cereal Rust Initiative" as drafted by C. James Peterson. Motion was seconded by Joe Anderson, and was passed by vote of NWIC members.

NWIC By-laws (see below). Modified by-laws were presented by R. Graybosch. Joe Anderson moved the revised by-laws be accepted by the NWIC; Brett Carver seconded; motion passed.

AWN report. Brett Carver. The Annual Wheat Newsletter remains solvent. Otherwise, you might not be reading this.

 

Informational items.

Patent application, Fusarium head blight resistance in durum wheat. A discussion was held on patent application US2005/0273875A1, "Fusarium resistant tetraploid wheat." The NWIC expressed concern over the potential impact of this patent application, if granted, on issues such as gene deployment and germ plasm exchange. A subcommittee will be established to further investigate the topic.

NWIC informational visit to Washington D.C. and Beltsville, MD, will occur in early March, 2006.

Research priorities. The NWIC voted to endorse, in order of preference, the following research priority areas. Increased emphasis and funding for these areas is encouraged.

a. National Rust Initiative
b. Regional Small Grains Genotyping Labs
c. Wheat Quality Enhancement
d. Small Grains Germplasm Enhancement, Aberdeen, ID

 

NWIC meeting, December, 2006: The next NWIC meeting will be held 13 December, 2006, in Raleigh, NC, in association with the National Scab Forum.

Prepared by R.A. Graybosch, Secretary, National Wheat Improvement Committee.

 

Note of Appreciation

The National Wheat Improvement Committee (hereafter designated NWIC) wishes to acknowledge former NWIC Chair Dr. David van Sanford's contributions to the National Wheat Improvement Committee, 2001-2005.

a. WHEREAS, Dr. David van Sanford volunteered his time, exceeding all expectations of service as member of the NWIC for five years, and contributing significantly to the advancement of wheat improvement research, and;
b. WHEREAS, as Chair of NWIC from 2001 to 2005 provided exemplary leadership raising national awareness and mobilizing support of two initiatives dedicated to Karnal bunt and stripe rust;
c. WHEREAS, his steadfast drive and vision led to continued expansion of cereal genomics research, most notably his dedication to establishment of the USDA-ARS wheat genotyping centers;
d. THEREFORE, be it resolved that the NWIC collectively expresses its most sincere appreciation to Dr. van Sanford for his distinguished service and innumerable contributions to the National Wheat Improvement community.

 

U.S. National Wheat Improvement Committee

The National Wheat Improvement Committee (hereafter designated NWIC) was formerly organized in Fargo, ND, 22 January, 1959. The original 'rules of procedure' were published in the Annual Wheat Newsletter, Volume VI, 1959. Bylaws (revised January 2006) are as follows:

1. Members: The NWIC shall consist of a chair plus 16 regional representatives. The USDA­ARS National Program Leader overseeing Grain Crops investigations shall serve as an ad hoc (nonvoting) member. Regional representatives shall be derived from each of the following wheat regional programs (committees):
a. Eastern/Southern Soft Wheat Workers
b. Spring Wheat Workers
c. Hard Winter Wheat Improvement Committee (Great Plains Wheat Workers)
d. Western Wheat Workers
2. Regional representatives shall be the four USDA­ARS Wheat Regional Nursery Coordinators (ex officio) and three additional representatives from each region. Procedures for election of regional representatives shall be at the discretion of each regional committee.
3. Proxy representation: If an NWIC member is unable to attend the annual meeting, a proxy may be designated. The proxy shall have full voting power. Voting at NWIC meetings is restricted to members or designated proxies.
4. Officers: The officers of the NWIC shall be a chair and a secretary.
a. The chair shall be duly elected by current NWIC members. Any individual actively engaged in U.S. wheat improvement is eligible for election as chair. Prior service of at least one term as an NWIC member is suggested as a prerequisite for nomination. Nominations for chair shall be solicited from current NWIC members, with elections held every three years. The term shall be for 3 years and shall commence on 1 January 1 subsequent to the year of election. The chair is eligible for re-election, and there are no term limits. If a chair is elected from current NWIC members, the regional committee shall appoint a successor to fulfill the remainder of the individual's term.
b. A secretary shall be appointed by the chair, and shall be selected from current NWIC members. The secretary shall serve a term concomitant with that of the chair. Minutes of each NWIC meeting shall be published in the Annual Wheat Newsletter.
5. Meetings: The NWIC shall hold at least one meeting per year, preferably at the time of a major wheat workers meeting. Special meetings may be called by the chair.
6. Quorum: A quorum shall consist of not fewer than nine members and shall include at least 1 representative from each of the four wheat regions.
7. Committee: The chair shall appoint such committees as deemed necessary to conduct activities of the NWIC. Personnel on such committees need not be limited to NWIC members.