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 76FEBRUARY 2017 SEEDWORLD.COM / 21 “Now we have all these different high- tech tools that allow us to track many traits at the same time,” he says. “There’s no question that the more traits you’re interested in, the more challenging it gets. But we think we can do it.” The team’s results will benefit the industry as a whole: his team has a smaller project, nested under a larger Genome Canada effort, that aims to produce breeding lines with differentiated aromas that will be made available to other seed companies and breeding programs. “We’ve had a lot of positive feedback about the work that we’re doing here, and we hope that other programs will shift their priorities and think some more about consumers from the beginning, rather than developing a product and asking consumers at the last minute if they like it,” he says. A Memorable Eating Experience This newfound focus on flavor is not con- fined to tomatoes. In the apple breeding industry, it’s actually been on the agenda for decades. There’s just less fruit to show for it, because of the length of time it takes to develop and release new apple varieties and grow trees — sometimes up to 30 years from start to finish. David Bedford has been an apple breeder at the University of Minnesota for 38 years. He says breeders have been trying to develop tastier apples since the 1960s. “In my mind, if we’re not producing something with a memorable eating experience, we’re just wasting our time,” he says. “We have plenty of apples that look nice enough on the shelf and are durable, but when you get home and the lights are out you still have to eat it.” Bedford is the brain behind the popular Honeycrisp apple, which reset the industry standard when it was released in 1991. As of October 2016, the famous Honeycrisp was No. 1 in dollars in Washington apple sales. More recently, Bedford has released SnowSweet, Zestar and SweeTango — the latter was released in 2009 and has quickly gained popularity across the United States and eastern Canada. In 2017, he expects to release the Rave/First Kiss apple, a grandchild of Honeycrisp. In order for a new apple variety to make it all the way to market release, it has to be extraordinary, says Bedford. “In our program, we have put the most emphasis on the two traits that I think PHOTOS: VINELAND RESEARCH AND INNOVATION CENTRE. With special equipment, David Liscombe, a researcher and biochemist at the Vineland Research Innovation Centre, is able to extract aromatic compounds for testing.