Amy et al:
Great job on the outline. I had a few comments.
Strengths - In addition to QTLs, there are probably candidate genes or genes or known function that might be useful to map, e.g. those related to texture and storage life such as endoPG, ACS and ACO, etc. where there are known alleles.
Embedding graduate students with breeding programs - This addresses the need to train the next generation of breeders. It may be difficult for ARS breeders not located at universities to participate in this aspect, although we all would probably welcome mentoring roles. I want to make sure there is a mechanism for integrate as fully as possible into the project.
Develop an active outreach program for public and industry stakeholders - Community of Practice on eXtension is a separate SCRI grant category, but I think you are wise to include it as part of the CAP. Are there other ways to reach industry stakeholders in a formal manner?
Richard L. Bell Research Horticulturist Pear Genetics and Breeding
USDA, ARS Appalachian Fruit Research Station 2217 Wiltshire Road Kearneysville, WV 25430-2771
Telephone: 1-304-725-3451 Ext. 353 Fax: 1-304-728-2340 Email: richard.bell@ars.usda.gov Website: www.ars.usda.gov/naa/afrs
-----Original Message----- From: gdr-list-bounces@mail.bioinfo.wsu.edu [mailto:gdr-list-bounces@mail.bioinfo.wsu.edu] On Behalf Of Amy Iezzoni Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 9:08 AM To: gdr-list@bioinfo.wsu.edu Subject: [GDR] RosBREED
Dear Colleagues,
A few months ago, the US Rosaceae Genetics, Genomics and Breeding Executive Committee, under the leadership of Gennario Fazio, began discussing community initiatives. RosBREED: Enablling marker assisted breeding in Rosaceae, arose from these discussions. As a result of a conference call last week, a small committee was put together to further develop our vision and goals for this community project targeting submission to the fortcoming US Specialty Crop Research Initiative. I agreed to lead the effort at this point and I have tentatively agreed to PI the proposal, depending on the due date. I want to thank the committee, especially Cameron Peace and Jim Olmstead who had a late night last night, for preparing an excellent outline for your review. Our goal was to ground the outline solidly with a vision, mission and justification, yet also provide sufficient detail on the objectives and approach so that you can provide critique. We invite your comments and changes to the attached outline. Please use track changes for your edits etc.
Upon reading the outline, you'll notice that under "Strategies to achieve objective 1", our goal is to test the robustness of marker trait associations over a wide range of germplasm (beyond the populations in which they were first discovered). To achieve this objective, I would like to ask for your help in compiling a list of available marker - trait associations. We will use this list as an in-house document from which we can select marker - trait associations for the proposed pipeline. Thank you in advance for your help.
Both the outline and table are attached. I began adding to the table to get it started. Unfortunately we are working on a very tight deadline and so we would appreciate your comments, suggestions, and Table additions by next Wed if possible.
We look forward to hearing from you and collaborating in any way possible.
Best regards, Amy