Project Number: 1907-21000-030-05
Project Type: Specific Cooperative Agreement

Start Date: Sep 15, 2004
End Date: Sep 14, 2009

Objective:
The objectives of this cooperative research project are to increase our understanding of genome organization of cereals and the QTLs associated with crop enhancement including response to the environment and nutritional improvement.

Approach:
1) Development of genetic and physical markers for maize. Annotation of maize sequences will be used to identify SSR sequences to be used as genetic markers. In addition we will use the regions of synteny established between the rice genome sequence and maize genetic and physical map markers to identify rice gene models for genetic marker development. These resources will be used to enhance the emerging integrated maize genetic and physical map. 2) Molecular and quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping of traits associated with improved crop performance and nutritional content in maize and other model species (i.e. Arabidopsis) will be carried out to isolate and characterize genes associated with these traits. We will leverage the near complete rice genome sequence and annotations and the known synteny among the grasses to identify candidate genes associated with QTLs and sequence these regions.