“At the PGRU gene bank, more than 12,500 accessions (populations) of vegetable crop species and their wild relatives are conserved as seed,” writes Labate. “Our mission is to acquire, maintain, characterize, and distribute these genetic resources. My research focuses on molecular and population genetic characterization of the collections in order to estimate diversity and how it is partitioned. In addition, quantification of health beneficial traits has become of high priority. Genetic and phenotypic characterization of the collections can enhance their value by helping end users decide which accessions to incorporate into breeding programs. After introducing the National Plant Germplasm System (NPGS) and PGRU, I will present recent research results using examples from tomato. Future planned projects (in tomato, wild tomato, tomatillo, winter squash, onion) and outreach activities will also be briefly described.”
Read more about Labate’s research at the PGRU Seed Crops Genetic Research website.
The seminar will run from 12:20 p.m. to 1:10 p.m. and originate in A134 Barton Hall, Geneva and be available via Polycom in 404 Plant Science.