Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52EUROPEAN-SEED.COM I EUROPEAN SEED I 35 Strong Seed. Healthy Grain. PETKUS. www.petkus.com TECHNOLOGY | INNOVATION | ENGINEERING | SERVICE PETKUS Innovations – We supply your solutions Reduce dust abrasion Improve germination capacity Increase cleaning efficiency Minimize kernel stress Boost processing performance Raise economic profits • Paul Gepts and his laboratory at the Department of Plant Sciences, University of California, Davis, United States. They focus on the definition of the processes that have shaped the evolution of crop plants under cultivation, and in particular of Phaseolus. Gepts also has strong expertise in plant breeding, and he currently leads the UC Davis bean breeding programme, and is curator of the PhaseolusGenes database. • Scott A. Jackson and his laboratory at the Center for Applied Genetic Technologies, University of Georgia, Athens, United States. They have broad expertise in genomics and bioinformatics, combined with up-to-date bioinformatics tools and large computational and storage resources. They also recently released the reference genome sequence of P. vulgaris. The complementary skills and synergy between the teams of the principal investigators are key to the success of the BEAN_ADAPT project, which will also promote collaborations and integration with, and among, other research groups, the seed industry, and other stakeholders. ASSOCIATED PARTNERS AND PRIVATE SECTOR INVOLVEMENT BEAN_ADAPT aspires to work with ‘bean community’ members, genebanks, plant breeders, stakeholders, the seed industry, and plant and crop scientists, to form a wide collaborative network. Within this network, all can contribute to the project, while also benefitting from the data produced and the outcomes reached. A kick-off meeting was hosted in August 2015 by the Global Crop Diversity Trust in Bonn, Germany, introducing and disseminating the project to those potentially interested as associated partners. Over 20 representatives from universities, institutes and companies participated, showing interest in collaborations within BEAN_ADAPT as associated partners. Participants also presented their work and outlined potential contributions to the project. To date, over 25 groups from institutes and companies all over the world (i.e. Europe, Canada, South Africa, Brazil) have joined BEAN_ADAPT as associated partners. These groups offer cooperation and/or association within specific activities connected to the mission and interests of the associated partner. These activities are related to contributions to phenotyping activities, to offers of germplasm, to analysis of seed and pod compositions and nutritional values, to tests for biotic and abiotic stress, and to dissemination of results and achievements to the public. For example, BEAN_ADAPT is currently collaborating with many associated partners including public and private institutions as the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), which is contributing germplasm, field trials, and phenotyping; the European Seed Association, which is helping with dissemination; IBBR-CNR (Italy) will conserve and distribute the BEAN_ADAPT germplasm to users; Starke Ayres Seed, from South Africa, will collaborate with tests to screen for biotic and abiotic stress as well as with small genotyping activities; and Gautier Semences (France) which will contribute in phenotyping activities. Organisations, institutions, stakeholders, seed companies, growers and research groups from the private sector can be involved with provision of financial support for specific initiatives, assistance with testing germplasm, and provision of plant material to be included in BEAN_ADAPT. BEAN_ADAPT’s contributions will further legume research and production by the consideration of the importance of protecting the environment, the promotion of increased use of systems involving legumes—which offers cheaper and more sustainable alternatives to conventional practices due to the symbiotic capture of atmospheric nitrogen, thus reducing the use of industrially-produced nitrogen. This project is particularly relevant to the future challenges of plant breeding and to identify genes/quantitative trait loci for important agronomic traits. This will be crucial for plant breeding and for obtaining new varieties, which will contribute to food security in a world that is in demographic expansion, and in the context of climate change. Editor’s Note: For contact information: Elisa Bellucci at e.bellucci@ univpm.it or info@beanadapt.org. BEAN_ADAPT has been considered a model as a high value project which aims to integrate technology transfer with the availability of germplasm directly to farmers for pre- breeding and breeding programmes. The availability of germplasm, information and data will endorse the multilateral system on access and benefit sharing established by 140 countries through the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. www.beanadapt.org