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SCIENCE & IT
Making changes to the world’s most important food source As an Honours distance education student at Charles Sturt University, Ben is looking at improving rice varieties by identifying genetic markers that lead to a more vigorous seedling, better able to outgrow weeds and withstand insect pests, potentially reducing the amount of water and herbicides used to grow rice crops across the world.
“Current varieties lack seedling vigour and this is a big problem for rice farmers as faster early growth would help seedlings out-grow and out-shade weeds.” Ben said. The many genes involved in such a complex trait as vigour are difficult, if not impossible, to track in traditional breeding programs, so development of molecular markers to identify these genes and select plants with them in a breeding program would be a considerable advantage. “Improving seedling vigour in rice industries such as Australia’s will assist in reducing the water consumed by rice crops. Since vigorous crops establish faster the overall time needed to grow a crop can be reduced so the period water is needed for the crop is reduced,” Ben said. “In rice fields around the world, weeds that choke out rice seedlings and the yield losses that result are a major problem and are often only solved with herbicide applications. Vigorous seedlings could represent a chemical-free and environmentally friendly alternative.”
Rice researcher and CSU Honours student Ben Ovenden (left) Ben’s search for genetic markers of seedling vigour in rice using a new Australian genome profiling tool known as Diversity Arrays Technology (DArT), has seen him awarded the prestigious AusBiotech NSW Student Excellent Award 2005. The new technology has not been applied before to rice improvement. Presented by the Australian Biotechnology Students Association, a special interest group of AusBiotech, the award identifies the CSU student as one of Australia’s leading emerging bioscientists and has recognised the importance of his research which has the potential to transform the way rice grows around the world. In his search for seedling vigour markers, Ben’s project developed into an exploration of how whole genome analysis can fit into a breeding program. “There are many factors, both environmental and genetic, that influences how fast a seedling grows,” Ben said. “This complicates the inheritance of seedling vigour, so improvement in traditional breeding has been limited.” Working with the Department of Primary Industries leading NSW rice breeder, Dr Russell Reinke, Ben examined a small rice population varying in seedling vigour and analysed a small number of genotypes using the DArT technology.
Dr Reinke said Ben's work has to be seen in context. “DArT analysis is a new technique, and Ben’s research was really a preliminary look-see to try and verify its usefulness.” “For one marker test you generally get one result about a specific gene but with a single DArT analysis you get up to 600 markers. Ben’s work has been very important to deciding how best to utilise this in the future. “DArT will have an increasing role in our (NSW Department of Primary Industries) breeding program and its value will increase as we understand more about it. It has application in any crop improvement program and I am aware that a sorghum breeding program in Queensland is planning to use it extensively in the near future.” Dr Reinke said the project had seen Ben and himself relate more as colleagues than as teacher and student. “Together we have improved our understanding of this new technique. Ben has had to assimilate a lot of information and think critically, great training for any scientist.” ends Author: Jane Coates
Editor's Note: Ben Ovenden is an Honours research student with Charles Sturt University's School of Agriculture and Veterinary Sciences. See more on the 2005 Student Excellent Awards from AusBiotech here. Media Note: Ben Ovenden is available for interview and CSU Media has photographs of Ben available upon request. Contact CSU Media. Related Images:  |
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