NCGA
Discusses Progress on Maize Genome Initiative with Key Stakeholders
(8-30-04)
Members of the National
Corn Growers Association (NCGA) joined a broad range of stakeholders,
including academics, industry representatives and government officials
last week in Des Moines, Iowa, to discuss progress on cooperative
efforts to sequence the maize genome.
Debate continues on how best to move forward with generation of
sequence information, making a clear case for a centralized high-quality
genome sequence resource for researchers, according to Gary Davis,
chair of NCGA’s Research and Business Development Action Team.
In an effort to address this concern, NCGA in March announced Ceres,
Inc., Monsanto Company and DuPont subsidiary Pioneer Hi-Bred International,
Inc., would transfer existing maize sequencing information to a
searchable database on the Internet. NCGA launched that database,
www.maizeseq.org, in July. The database is hosted by the Donald
Danforth Plant Science Center.
“Corn is the most economically important plant in the United
States, and we continue to find new uses,” Davis said. “If
this genome sequencing effort improves yield by even 1 percent,
then it will easily pay for itself.”
Nathan Danielson, NCGA’s director of biotechnology and business
development, said the meeting brought together the groups that will
benefit most from increased research on the maize genome. The group
discussed application of this genome research to produce better
crops, identified what research needs to be emphasized to best benefit
all participants and outlined how to accomplish this research.
One major concern voiced by the group was that because the corn
genome sequence is not complete, corn researchers are being forced
to use other plants when asking scientific questions.
“A lot of research to date has been done on Arabidiposis (a
member of the mustard family used as a model organism in plant biology),
and it has answered some important questions,” said Corn Board
member Kyle Phillips, a farmer from Knoxville, Iowa. “But
in order to continue to feed the world in the future, we must now
work on crop plants as well. It is clearly time to move beyond the
model plant and onto a plant that will actually increase value to
American growers and consumers.”
Another issue the group addressed was the need for funding to move
from genomics to actual application of information to produce better
crops. Even after the genome is mapped, funding will be necessary
to support further examination and application of the sequence,
according to Dr. Jo Messing of Rutgers University.
“Once we have the sequence completed and in the right order,
it will still be very important to continue investigation into the
function and regulation of the genes,” he said. “And
one of the concerns at the meeting was whether sufficient funding
will be there for those efforts.”
The group also discussed the need to understand the genetic diversity
that exists in corn. According to Danielson, quality research shows
that certain types of corn don’t contain all of the genes
that other types possess.
“To truly understand the species, we’ll need to understand
some genetic sequences from a number of different types of corn,”
he said. “And we’ll need to have a detailed reference
sequence for comparison.”
Messing said mapping the corn genome, which is comparable in size
to the human genome, is a task of overwhelming proportions and couldn’t
be completed in a timely manner by any single entity. He said a
completed maize genome would be an invaluable resource for genomics
research.
“This effort could not be done by smaller individual groups,”
he said. “There has been a bottleneck with the mapping of
this genome that hasn’t allowed us to move forward, but once
that bottleneck is removed, there are many groups out there that
will advance in their own research very quickly. My colleagues in
the academic community are very grateful to the National Corn Growers
Association for advancing the analysis of the functions of the maize
genome.”
Academics won’t be only group to benefit from a completed
genome, Davis said. “It’s a win-win situation for everyone
involved,” he said. “In addition to the research community,
this effort will benefit growers and consumers.”