Investment
Investment
GRDC Code: UOA2411-002RTX
Reducing barley post-grain filling yield losses: Developing a robust screening pipeline for barley head-loss.
Barley head-loss is an ongoing problem in Australia that leads to reduced yields based on environmental factors and cultivar sensitivity. As recently as 2022/23, grower and advisor reports estimate that head-loss in barley crops cost growers between 5-25% of yield. Although management practices can limit yield losses, they are not always practical and can add costs to farming operations. Better genetic solutions are required for head-retention, particularly in popular cultivars that show sensitivity to head-loss, but the identification of genetic components has been challenged by confounding G x E x M factors and a lack of a standardised screening protocols. Recent research has identified architectural features of the barley peduncle that correlate with improved head-retention in delayed harvest trials, and has explored the use of enabling technologies to track these features at scale. This investment will leverage current investments involving barley field trials, and apply these enabling technologies to develop a higher-throughput cost-effective phenotyping pipeline for large scale measurement of head-retention. The information generated using this approach will form the basis for pre-breeding strategies to target improved tolerance to head-loss in multiple environments.
- Project start date:
- 01/10/2024
- Project end date:
- 30/11/2026
- Crop type:
-
- Barley, (Cereal)
- Organisation
- The University of Adelaide
- Region:
- North, South, West
- Project status
-
Active