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 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90 Page 91 Page 92 Page 93 Page 94 Page 95 Page 96 Page 97 Page 98 Page 99 Page 100 Page 101 Page 102 Page 103 Page 104 Page 105 Page 106 Page 107 Page 108 Page 109 Page 110 Page 111 Page 112 Page 113 Page 114 Page 115 Page 116 Page 117 Page 118 Page 119 Page 120 Page 121 Page 122 Page 123 Page 124 Page 125 Page 126 Page 127 Page 128 Page 129 Page 130 Page 131 Page 132 Page 133 Page 134 Page 135 Page 136 Page 137 Page 138 Page 139 Page 140 Page 141 Page 142 Page 143 Page 144 Page 145 Page 146 Page 147 Page 148EXPLORING THE NEW WORLD OF WHEAT A MAP IS the greatest of all epic poems — its lines and colors show the realization of great dreams. Gilbert Grosvenor, the first editor of National Geographic, said that. Curtis Pozniak learned the same lesson after helping play a major role in the mapping of the bread wheat genome, a project that could serve to turn the world of wheat on its head. “I equate it to looking at the sun. It’s such a massive genome, and we’re still in the early stages of analyzing its composition and organization. We now have the genetic blueprint,” says Pozniak, a wheat breeder and professor at the University of Saskatchewan’s Crop Development Centre. “Now comes the real work of deciphering the code to understand how wheat ticks.” Pozniak co-leads the Canadian Triticum Applied Genomics (CTAG2 ) project with Andrew Sharpe of the Global Institute of Food Security. In early 2016, Pozniak and his team worked to ensure the entire genome of the Chinese Spring wheat vari- ety was mapped completely and accurately. The variety was selected due to its wide use in genome studies. Nearly 100 percent of the genome has been mapped, and is available for download through the International Wheat Genome Sequencing Consortium’s (IWGSC) wheat sequence repository at URGI-INRA-Versailles, France. North American wheat acreage has declined in favor of corn, which had its genome mapped in 2009. Since then, it has enjoyed a renaissance, with the release of a multitude of new varieties that include better stress tolerance, disease resistance and higher yields. The new wheat genome map is a tool that’s going to do for wheat what’s already been done with corn and other crops, says IWGSC executive director Kellye Eversole. “We really need to enable the development of next-genera- tion breeding tools, and to do that you really need a sequence. This is long overdue.” Researcher Curtis Pozniak is at the forefront of helping discover the genetic intricacies of a major global crop. Marc Zienkiewicz 82 / SEEDWORLD.COM DECEMBER 2016 Canadian researcher Curtis Pozniak’s wheat breeding program at the University of Saskatchewan funded the majority of the sequencing and assembly work for the completed sequence of the Chinese Spring genome.