Diversity in

Plant Breeding

5th Biennial Plant Breeding Symposium at NC State

Thursday February 6th 8:00 AM - 5:30 PM

Talley Student Union, 3rd Floor - State Ballroom

Schedule of Events

8:00 - 8:40 AM Registration with light breakfast

8:40 - 8:50 AM Welcome, Sydney Graham, Dr.

Charles Stuber, Dr. Carlos

Iglesias

8:50 - 9:00 AM Welcome, Dr. Steve Lommel,

Associate Dean for Research

CALS

9:00 - 10:00 AM Dr. Chris Reberg Horton, NC

State University

10:00 - 11:00 AM Dr. Jack Dekkers, Iowa State

University

11:00 - 11:15 AM Morning Break

11:15 - 12:15 PM Dr. Hale Ann Tufan, Cornell

University

12:15 PM Photo of NCSU Participants

12:15 - 1:30 PM Lunch in Coastal Ballroom

1:30 - 2:45 PM Panel Discussion with Industry

Representatives

2:45 - 3:00 PM Afternoon Break

3:00 - 4:00 PM Dr. Robin Buell, Michigan State

University

4:00 - 4:15 PM Closing Remarks

4:15 - 5:30 PM Poster Session with hors

d'oeuvres (in Costal Ballroom)

Invited Speakers

Creating a cover crop

breeding network

Dr. Chris Reberg-Horton, North

Carolina State University

Design of breeding

programs using genomics

Dr. Jack Dekkers, Iowa State

University

Chris was raised in Fairview, a small mountain community in western North Carolina. He obtained his B.S. from the University of North Carolina, his M.S. from the University of California at Davis in Agronomy and his PhD from North Carolina State University. His current research seeks to put better cover crop tools in the hand of farmers. On a tour of Chris’s cover crop research you can see breeding work currently being done on NC State research stations in cereal rye for allopathic properties against weeds, and legume cover crop species- hairy vetch, crimson clover, and winter peas, as well as soil moisture sensors under cover crops grown prior to corn on private farms.

Jack grew up in the Netherlands and received B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in animal science from the Wageningen Agricultural University and a Ph.D. in dairy science with a focus on animal breeding and genetics from the University of Wisconsin. Jack is currently at

Iowa State University where he is a C.F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor and Leader of the Animal Breeding and Genetics group. His current research focuses on the genetic basis and improvement of feed efficiency and health in pigs and poultry and on the integration of quantitative and molecular genetics and genomics in animal breeding programs. Jack was the recipient of the J.L. Lush and Rockefeller Prentice Awards in Animal Breeding from the American Dairy Science Association and the American Society of Animal Science in 2004 and 2007.

Invited Speakers

Closing the gap between

genes and gender in plant

breeding

Dr. Hale Ann Tufan, Cornell

University

Interrogating and manipulating

the potato genome to enable

diploid-based breeding

approaches in the most popular

vegetable in the world

Dr. Robin Buell, Michigan State

University,

Hale completed her PhD at the John Innes Centre, and worked for CIMMYT, University of East Anglia School of International Development. Her current work focuses on

building gender responsive agricultural research systems, as principle investigator of the Gender Responsive Researchers Equipped for Agricultural Transformation project, as well as leading participatory breeding and gender research work with the NextGen Cassava project. Hale is also the 2019 recipient of the Norman Borlaug Award for Field Research and Application.

Dr. C. Robin Buell received her Ph.D. from Utah State University in 1992 and she joined the Department of Plant Biology at MSU in 2007. Her research is focused on the genome biology of plants and plant pathogens, including comparative genomics, bioinformatics, and computational biology. She was a central member of the consortium that generated the rice genome sequence and developed a public database for rice researchers. Currently, she maintains Spud DB and the Maize Genome Resource. Dr. Buell has served as an advisor to several large plant genome research consortia and the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Genetically Engineered Crops. She is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement for Science and the American Society of Plant Biologists.

Industry Panelists

Dr. Laura Mayor, Corteva

Dr. Mayor completed her BS in Agronomy and MS in Genetics at the University of Rosario in Argentina. She earned her PhD at Iowa State University in Plant Breeding. She started at DuPont Pioneer as a Molecular Breeding Scientist in corn for the Southeast of the US and moved into sorghum molecular breeding in 2011 to establish and deploy a molecular breeding strategy for this crop. Since 2013 she has been responsible for the sorghum breeding project located in Manhattan, KS. Over the three years her responsibilities were extended to Evaluation Zone lead for

this crop that includes developing and planning a breeding strategy for the Eastern Kansas and High Plains sorghum markets covering the Manhattan, KS and Plainview, TX research stations. Major breeding focus of the evaluation zone are improved yield, stalk strength, sugarcane aphid tolerance and cold tolerance using new phenotyping and molecular technologies available.

Dr. Jimena Davis, Syngenta

Jimena leads the global Modeling Group in Analytics and Data Sciences at Syngenta, located in Research Triangle Park, NC. Her current team enables data-driven decision support by combining applied mathematics and data science capabilities for the design, development, and placement of crop solutions. Jimena earned her Ph.D. from NCSU in Computational and Applied Mathematics in 2008. Prior to that, she received a B.S. in Mathematical Sciences from Clemson University. Jimena spent four years at the US Environmental Protection Agency as a Mathematical

Statistician in the National Center for Computational Toxicology, where she focused on developing mathematical and statistical models for uncertainty analysis of risk assessments. She joined Syngenta in 2012 as a Senior Computational Biologist modeling plant biological pathways to support gene candidate discovery for plant traits and breeding projects in multiple crops.

Dr. Dawn Fraser, Bayer

Dr. Dawn Fraser is originally from Scotland, she studied Crop and Soil Science at Edinburgh University before completing a Master’s Degree in Plant Pathology at North Carolina State University working with Dr. Paul Shoemaker and Dr. Randy Gardner. She earned her PhD in Plant Breeding and Plant Pathology under Dr. Paul Murphy. After graduating Dr. Fraser worked as a cotton breeder with Delta and Pine Land Company in Hartsville, South

Carolina, developing commercial cotton varieties for the Upper Southeastern US. In 2015, she became a Commercial Development Breeder for Monsanto responsible for developing and selecting commercial soybean and cotton varieties for the Southeastern US. She is continuing this role with Bayer Cropscience and has more than 20 patents for commercial cotton varieties, many of which are currently in the Deltapine portfolio of products.

Posters

1. Validation of Freeze Tolerance Quantitative Trait Loci in St.

Augustinegrass, Sydney Graham, Susana Milla-Lewis, NC

State University

2. Participatory Plant Breeding: Effect of Agronomic

Management Intensity on Below-ground and Above-ground

Corn Traits Under Organic Systems, Christopher Mujjabi,

Martin O. Bohn, University of Illinois Champaign–Urbana

3. Exploring the genetic basis of yield in a biparental wheat

population, Noah DeWitt, NC State University, Gina Brown-

Guedira, USDA-ARS

4. Advance line trial testing of winter peas for cover crop use,

Lais Bastos Martins, Chris Reberg-Horton, NC State

University

5. A Phased Chromosome-Scale Genome Assembly for

Pineapple (Ananas comosus var. comosus), Ashley G.

Yow, Massimo Iorizzo, NC State University

6. Genomic vs. phenotypic selection for Fusarium ear rot

resistance and Fumonisin Reduction in maize, Eric Butoto,

NC State University, James B. Holland, USDA-ARS

7. From Genomes to Fields: Exploring genotype-by-

environment interactions and environment specific

prediction in maize hybrids, Anna Rogers, NC State

University, James B. Holland, USDA-ARS

8. Bypassing endosperm failure in interspecific crosses of

wheat, Selena Lopez, Eric Olson, Michigan State University

9. Progress & Plans for Drought Resistance Breeding in St.

Augustinegrass, Greta Rockstad, Susana Milla-Lewis, NC

State University

Posters (cont.)

10. Understanding Genetic Resistance to Bacterial Wilt in

Tomatoes, Jenny Myers, Dilip Panthee, NC State University

11. Freeze Response Regulation in Vaccinium

corymbosum (L.) Floral Buds, Lauren Redpath, Hamid

Ashrafi, NC State University

12. Screening Ipomoea spp. for Improved Drought Tolerance in

Cultivated Sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam), Stella

Nhanala, G. Craig Yencho, NC State University

13. Phenotypic characterization of Banana germplasm to

improve nutritional profile in commercial banana, Bryan

Munoz, Massimo Iorizzo, NC State University

14. To Branch or Not to Branch: Image-based Phenotyping of

Tiller Formation in Sorghum and Maize, Kevin Lehner, John

McKay, Colorado State University

15. Breeding with Potentially Alternative Allelic Variability

Affecting Lower Nicotine Content in Flue-Cured Tobacco,

Nathaniel Burner, Ramsey S. Lewis, NC State University

16. Preliminary Mapping of Fusarium Head Blight Resistance in

NC13-20076 Soft Red Winter Wheat, Zachary Winn, NC

State University, Paul Murphy, USDA-ARS

17. Characterization of Southeastern Heirloom Maize Varieties,

Matthew S. Woore, NC State University, James B.

Holland, USDA-ARS

18. Comparative transcriptome analysis of two contrasting

maize inbreds provides insights on molecular mechanisms

for stalk rot resistance, Andres Salcedo, Lina Quesada, NC

State University

Thanks to our generous sponsors!

This event is organized by:

Planning Committee:

Sydney Graham

Lais Bastos Martins

Jenny Myers

Cassie Newman

Nicole Choquette

Jessica Brown

To view the recorded talks and for more information please

visit: http://www.plantbreedingcenter.ncsu.edu/sym.html