National Bioresources Project-Wheat

Takashi R. Endo

Laboratory of Plant Genetics, Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University,

Corresponding author: Takashi R. Endo

E-mail: trendo@kais.kyoto-u.ac.jp

In 2002, the Japanese government launched the National Bioresource Project (NBRP) in order to promote scientific researches collectively not only in Japan but also in the world.  The aims of NBRP are the strategic propagation, maintenance, and distribution of living organisms, cells and DNA clones of major plant and animal species, one of which is wheat.  NBRP-Wheat (Komugi in Japanese) was originally assigned to a core group consisting of the Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University (LPGKU, MOZUME), Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama City University (KIBR), and the Faculty of Agriculture, Tottori University (TACBOW).  Researchers in Japan conducting wheat studies form a committee to support the core group.

NBRP-Wheat is in charge of wheat (genus Triticum and genus Aegilops) and other related species, rye (genus Secale) and oats (genus Avena).  Plant strains collected are being examined for morphological and genomic characters before seed propagation and conservation.  During the first stage of NBRP-Wheat, 2002-2006, more than 7000 wheat stocks, including wild species, landraces and genetic stocks, have been collected, propagated and conserved.  Also, more than a million genomic DNA and EST clones have been collected and conserved, and more than a half million ESTs have being analyzed.  All data is stored in the NBRP section of the database KOMUGI.  The registered seed stocks and DNA clones are available through the internet service (http://www.shigen.nig.ac.jp/wheat/komugi/top/top.jsp).

The Laboratory of Plant Genetics, Kyoto University (LPGKU) is in charge of the collection of various seed stocks of wheat (Triticum) that were produced in the past during genetic studies on wheat.  These stocks have been propagated after cytological examination.  The following seed stocks (642 as of November 2007) have been collected at LPGKU and registered at the database KOMUGI for wide distribution (Table 1). 

In 2007, the second stage of NBRP-Wheat has started.  In the second stage, in addition to maintain and to distribute the genetic stocks collected during the first stage of NBRP-Wheat, we are focusing on collecting polymorphic DNA markers that would be useful in genetic studies and wheat breeding.  The second stage of NBRP-Wheat is planned to continue until 2012 to achieve the best collection of wheat genetic stocks in the world.