Plant Breeder article ?

  

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Truthfully labelled seeds

•       Truthful labeling is compulsory for all kinds of notified varieties before their sale in the market.

•       This means that the label on the seed container truthfully describes the seed quality in terms of physical & genetic purities, and germination, these should conform to the standards for the certified seed of the crop concerned.

•       The seed company or seed producer takes the guarantee of quality seed production as per seed act and that the seed offered for sale meets the quality parameters described in the label.

Manager Parent Seed Production (PSP) Job Profile

•       It is imperative that the seed quality standards are rigidly maintained.

•       Works in close collaboration with R&D team with a focus on studying the agronomic behavior of the parental lines and determining the optimum conditions for seed production.

•       Also evaluates the major strengths and weaknesses of the parental lines and develops recommendations for the sowing pattern, flowering synchronization of male and female parental lines, phyto sanitary requirements, and nutrient management

•       Manages the PSP to ensure that the requisite quantity of parent seed of the specified genetic purity is produced and supplied to the production personnel well in time.

•       The quantity of the parent seed to be produced is determined based on the quantity of the truthfully labelled seed to be produced and the seed multiplication ratio for the crop concerned.

•       Direct responsibilities include planning the production of parental seed, selection of appropriate locations for the same, and actual production of the parental seed of all varieties requested to be produced.

COMMERCIAL PLANT BREEDER

•       Respond appropriately to enquiries from farmers, agronomists and other professionals.

•       Share details of the breeding programs with relevant scientists in the team and maintain proper documents and records of pedigree for providing to Protection of Plant Varieties Farmers Rights Authority (PPVFRA), National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) and other regulatory authorities.

•       Plan crosses and oversee the crossing programs to generate new genotypes for field and protected cultivation.

•       Capable of gathering, analyzing, and interpreting scientific data in laboratory and field trials and selecting the best genotypes.

•       Conduct laboratory studies during the off-season.

•       Create and maintain detailed records throughout the R&D process.

•        Manage, support and train technical and field staff.

•       Keep abreast of the rapidly developing areas of the relevant disciplines and translate ideas from scientific literature into innovative approaches to breeding.

•        Monitor the activities of competitors (in commercial settings) and develop a market-relevant product profile.

•       Has to Handle the breeding programs designed to develop improved variettes commercialization. ATPER

•       Must have Clear understanding of the fundamentals of conventional plant breeding and fair knowledge of several interdisciplinary sciences

•       Good familiarity with some of the areas related to crop improvement and should know how to interact and collaborate with experts in other related areas.

•       It is desirable that he has the following qualities/abilities.

•       A clear commitment to team-based processes

•       Ability to frame research goals and objectives, and estimate the approximate investment of financial and other resources.

•       Good familiarity with research methods and techniques for refining plant breeding

•        Trained to identify and select plants with desirable traits, from the available germplasm

•       Strong skills in using the statistical software R in applied situations. In a functional matrix team, he has to work closely in an internal network of breeding, plant pathology, entomology and molecular biology functions or he has to connect/report to other team members of various function, viz., plant pathology, entomology and molecular biology for product development.

 

PRE BREEDER JOB PROFILE

•       Pre breeding-All activities designed to identify desirable characteristics and/or genes from un adapted material and to transfer these to an intermediate set of material

•       Some examples

•       Distant hybridization leading to introgression lines, Transfer of desirable traits/genes from land races and other crude germplasm lines into elite germplasm lines, etc.

•       Pre breeding is a necessary first step in the use of genetic diversity present in the wild relatives and other unimproved materials.

•       Pre-breeder should have the ability to manage multiple projects with a high degree of flexibility, Work closely with colleagues on complex projects in a matrix team structure, Deliver aggressive business innovation targets while maintaining scientific excellence, and

 

SEED INDUSTRY OVER THE YEARS

•       The seed industry has evolved to the present vastly automated and computerized operations.

•       Manual labour is almost abolished for many operations.

•       Large portions of the field data are now collected by handheld data recording devices and automatically transferred to laptops and stored in Research Database Management Systems (RDBMS).

•       Biotechnology has become an indispensable tool for insertion of novel genes for tracking germplasm movement in backcross programs, and for accurate identification of Intellectual Property Rights-protected genetic material. Technologies like Marker- Assisted Breeding, Doubled Haploids and Genomic selection have become an integra part of plant breeding programmes.

•       These modern plant breeding technologies are enabling the creation of new product lines suitable for different agro climatic conditions and end-uses, and creating new frontiers of advancement

•       The private sector is capable of capitalizing on the available resources and generate a good amount of revenue through the commercialization of their products.

•       The integration of sophisticated technologies, such as marker-assisted breeding, gene mapping, gene editing, speed breeding, and phenotyping into plant breeding programs has boosted the momentum of R&D growth

•       Companies are prioritizing- Quality germplasm, Highly efficient operations, Impactful go-to-market strategies, Strong distributor networks and Growers relations to gain a competitive edge and profitability in the market.

•       Despite all advancements, conventional plant breeding will always remain the core of plant breeding programs

 

 

THE NEEDS OF PLANT BREEDING INDUSTRY

•       Needs of large multinational seed companies (MNCs) are different from those of regional, smaller companies.

•       MNCs prefer to have breeders with language skills, or who are natives of countries where they operate.

•       They also expect the breeder to be a good team player with good communication and peoples skills (the ability to deal with people in a friendly and effective way) to have effective interactions with their global teams.

•       • Geographical scale of operation of a company does not determine the kind of plant breeding skills needed. Plant breeders anywhere in the world need the same set of basic skills and they all connect instantly when they discuss their programs.

 

SEED INDUSTRY

•       Offers a sense of community that encourages people to be open-minded and to collaborate widely

•       Diverse in nature consisting of Large multinational companies, Small- and medium-sized regional seed companies, and

•       Seed production and distribution companies wholly owned by agrichemical companies or life science companies, closely affiliated but independent agricultural chemical companies and seed companies, and Specialty biotechnology companies that provide technical service on contract or license own proprietary technologies to seed companies.

 

 

SKILL NEEDED TO BE PLANT BREEDER

•       In addition to having technical breeding expertise, today's plant breeder must also possess legal knowledge, business acumen, and people skills.

•       The uses of many new technologies and sources of genetic variation are now constrained by Intellectual Property laws and/or biosafety regulations, including those relating to food safety. The cost of regulatory approval for a single transgenic event in developing countries can be as much as $10 million.

•       This calls for a new level of field and financial management and a detailed appreciation of bioregulatory law, since oversights can be expensive and sometimes fatal to small private sector companies.

•       With more and more breeding programs guided by profit considerations, today's plant breeder also must have a good understanding of the factors that affect the adoption of new varieties, patterns of adoption, and reasons for their eventual success or failure

•       Last but not least, today's plant breeder must be able to work effectively as a member of a team Teams are increasingly important in research, where the breadth of expertise required for success is well beyond the scope of any individual member

•       A plant breeder today is a systems biologist who understands the components of G, E, and GE; locates new sources of genetic variation that correct weaknesses in cultivars and introgresses them efficiently; and integrates the relevant disciplines in a field setting to create a new product that is superior for target traits, stable in performance across locations, and acceptable to growers and consumers. Breeder possesses strong knowledge of genetics and information management and draws upon elements of many other disciplines, including pathology, entomology, crop physiology, experimental design and analysis, remote sensing, and soil and environmental sciences.

•       Although breeder must be comfortable with laboratory techniques, She or He is committed first and foremost to high quality, high throughput fieldwork, observing plant response in the target environment.

•       It is in the field that putative yield enhancing mechanisms are properly tested and where they must demonstrate improved or stabilized crop yields under realistic production conditions.

•       A breeder must be able to understand, critically evaluate, and use new methods emerging from many diverse fields of investigation and different disciplines, and to evaluate their potential for improved rates of genetic gain.

•       This calls for flexibility, openness, a commitment to staying abreast of the professional literature, and a willingness to retrain.

•       Marker-assisted selection (MAS) involves the transfer of a piece of DNA (including the gene of interest) associated with a specific phenotype.

•       Application of modern plant breeding methods based on genomics, transformation, and marker assisted selection requires highly specialized knowledge and skills.

•       Does this mean that today's plant breeders need to be experts in both conventional breeding and moleculer breeding techniques?

•       Probably not the range of knowledge is simply too great for most individuals to master.

•       For the majority of commercial breeders, a solid grounding in the more traditional plant breeding skills continues to be the most useful skill set, but they must be familiar with the new techniques, understand their potential, and be able to collaborate with others having the appropriate expertise.

•       Because the value of a plant variety is determined by its performance in farmers' fields, commercial seed companies sell products based on phenotypes.

•       Gene researchers and transgene developers can conduct much of their research in controlled laboratory environments, but breeders charged with developing final products normally must work in the field, preferably within the target environment where the cultivar is expected to perform.

•       Field-based research generates information about germplasm

•       The central skill in plant breeding has always been knowledge of genetics

•       Plant breeders use their knowledge of quantitative genetics, with its foundation in statistics, mathematics, and Mendel's laws, to estimate heritability, genetic variation, gene action, and G E interaction-all critical to x the design of an efficient breeding and testing system. Most successful breeders also have a good functional knowledge of physiology, pathology, entomology, soil science, and experimental design

•       Until the late 1980s, the plant breeder's tool kit consisted mainly of what could be characterized as a quantitative genetics-based knowledge,

•       By late 1980s, molecular genetics information started being used to develop powerful new breeding tools. For the first time, breeders were able to relate variation in phenotype to variation at the DNA sequence level

•       To use use and exploit DNA-based information for crop improvement, breeders must acquire knowledge and

•       Skills that relate to the identification and manipulation of specific DNA sequence

•        Genomics deals with the physical structure of the genome (structural genomics), as well as with gene products and gene interactions (functional genomics), and is built on a foundation of molecular genetics. automated laboratory tools, and bioinformatics.

•       The plant breeding software, keystone of seed business information

•       Researchers and technicians, you are probably using a plant breeding software for your daily activities in breeding, agronomy, analytical, product development and production. You save your information and know-how in the system, so you need powerful tools to collect data, validate the information, take decisions and monitor your activity. Its efficiency, such as any collaborative tool, should rely on the satisfaction of every user and its ability to share information fastly and securely throughout the whole department. The plant breeding software must fulfill three main goals for the breeding department, Organize the work along all research activities, and save time at the key steps of the season

•       Provide all the tools needed along the breeding process for researchers and technicians to plan, conduct and analyze its studies with decision-making support

•       Connect all the actors of the research department to facilitate safe sharing of data and proceedings from the set-up of research objectives to production

•       Research departments priorities when using plant breeding software