Research project AdaptiveTarget: Accessing haplotype variation at complex loci with optimized targeting [...]

Genetic variation at resistance loci is crucial for sustained crop yield, given the challenges and increased pest and pathogen pressures resulting from a warming climate. Despite recent advances in massively parallel sequencing, disease resistance loci and other complex genomic regions of great practical, economical and scientific importance remain challenging to study. The severe limitations of current methods pose a major problem for fully understanding and harnessing genetic variation for crop improvement.

We will develop AdaptiveTarget as a method based on targeted long-read sequencing, that will allow researchers and breeders to quickly, efficiently and inexpensively obtain population-level haplotype information for complex genomic regions such as resistance genes and self-incompatibility loci in plants. To explore the innovation potential of our ERC-funded research we will first undertake research to test and validate the project idea. Validation will benefit from known haplotype data for the complex S-locus supergene, produced in the ERC-funded project SuperGenE.

To demonstrate the general utility of the method, we will apply it to real-world examples consisting of complex loci of agronomic importance. Our AdaptiveTarget method could greatly facilitate assessment of genetic variation at complex genomic regions of outstanding interest. Therefore, our method could facilitate development of more efficient methods to conduct precision breeding for disease and pest resistance.

The project is funded by the European Research Council Proof of Concept grant.