Title: Optimizing marker-assisted breeding systems for drought tolerance in cereals through linkage of physiological and genetic models
Period: July 2005 to December 2007
Objectives: The dynamic linkage of crop modeling and genetic/breeding simulation allows us to simulate such things as the introgression or marker assisted selection of traits as affected by population genetic structures, selection criteria (e.g. direct or indirect selection for yield) and trait by environment interactions. The aim of this project is to build up the gene to trait information using data from QTL and physiological experiments and to further improve the ability of our crop simulation models to capture the effects of traits and their integration to yield. It will aim to combine these ‘gene-to-phenotype' physiological models with existing genetic models for other traits such as disease and quality. Simulating molecular breeding programs will enable optimization of MAS strategies and provide a platform for integrating a range of knowledge-based outputs from GCP into breeding programs.