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Moderated conference on Genomics in Food and Agriculture

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Biotech-Mod3 <[log in to unmask]>
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Date:
Sat, 9 Mar 2013 19:14:33 +0100
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My name is Uche Godfrey Okeke. I have a masters in Bioinformatics and Systems biology and a bachelors in Animal breeding and Genetics. I am currently a Bio-informatician at the DNA Sequencing and Genomics Lab, Institute of Biotech, University of Helsinki, Finland.

I must confess that I am a bit disappointed with the number of people contributing to this topic on the role of genomics in plant and livestock improvement in developing countries especially now that there is a wave of projects focusing on the application of genomic selection in many species of plants and animals across the developed world.

I am indeed very delighted as an African about this technology - Genomic selection. Genomic selection provides a way to incorporate Mendelian sampling into breeding thus allowing genomic prediction for young animals and plants. This is a sharp contrast to the age of progeny testing and several field trials required to ascertain the genetic merit of an individual. The direct consequence of this is that we in the developing world endowed with a great diversity of previously non-bred plant and animal species can start a breeding program now and be able to make fast genetic gains in a little time as compared to the time gains were made in the developed world using phenotypic breeding.

Secondly, I am also delighted (as I have always upheld this opinion) that genomic selection is a plus for food security. In Africa especially and other developing countries, the concept of food, food ingredients and nutrition differs from that of the developed world. Across regions, religions, tribes, geographical locations and so on, food and food ingredients vary greatly and even similar ones differ in their texture, taste, processing and cooking methods. This is a pointer that a niche market of food systems exist in these regions. With genomic selection, a tremendous progress can be made to develop these market niches by breeding crops and animals that satisfy the demands of these markets. Again, the main point here is that since Mendelian sampling can be utilized for breeding purposes, individuals (genotypes) with superb qualities for the support of these niche markets which previously have been discarded during breeding can be harnessed and properly utilized.

A lot of scientists, especially plant breeders, have argued that the only reason they are adopting this technology is because of the reduction in generation interval when compared to phenotypic breeding. Well, if this is the only stuff they see as gain, there its still a difference especially considering the fact that time is a key factor in breeding.

I want to point out the issue of reduced genetic variation in a population undergoing selection. The fear is that no gain will be made after some time because there is no more variation to support new gains. I want to point out an idea I have nurtured over time and which someone else shared and even had some explanations to back it up. In 2012, I was at a lecture by Professor Morris Soller (from Dept. of Genetics, Hebrew University; a lecture organised by the University of Helsinki) who coined out a phrase for this idea - selection induced genetic variation (SIGV). I gathered from this lecture that in a population under selection, genetic variation can be introduced by epistasis and recombination. It is particularly plausible to me (from my own ideas) that additive-by-additive epistasis (to any powers) and favorable recombination can combine very good genes thus developing novel gene expressions that will be superior to the average of the population. This gets more interesting if you consider the fact that some of these good genes might be pleiotropic thus offering better chances. I think we are yet to see the outcomes when breeding enabled by genomic selection starts and am pretty optimistic about this.

Finally, next generation sequencing is a wow technology. Who would have imagined a decade or two ago that people could do a mini sequencing job for a rarely known species with a low budget for the purposes of generating markers for breeding. I think a lot of achievements have been made in the field of agricultural genomics and more are coming.

My only concern is that African leaders, governments, and those in authority do not really understand the enormous potential and benefits embedded in investing in this technology especially for countries like mine (Nigeria) with a lot of human and natural resources, skill and biodiversity to make progress with this technology.

My goal with this piece is to start up a debate that will be beneficial for the implementation of genomic selection in Africa and other developing countries.

Uche Godfrey Okeke.
DNA Sequencing and genomics Lab
Institute of Biotechnology
University of Helsinki,
Finland.
Email: urchgene (at) gmail.com , urchgene (at) yahoo.com
Skype: urchgene

[Epistasis is the interaction between genes at different loci, e.g. one gene suppresses the effect of another gene that is situated at a different locus. Pleiotropy is the simultaneous effect of a given gene on more than one apparently unrelated trait. The selection induced genetic variation (SIGV) hypothesis was described by Y. Eitan and M. Soller (2004. Selection induced genetic variation: A new model to explain direct and indirect effects of sixty years of commercial selection for juvenile growth rate in broiler chickens, with implications for episodes of rapid evolutionary change. In: S. Wasser (ed.). Evolutionary theory and processes: Modern horizons. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht. p. 153–176). It argues that because of epistasis, long term selection can continuously generate part of the genetic variation required for its own continued response...Moderator].

[To contribute to this conference, send your message to [log in to unmask] For further information on this FAO Biotechnology Forum, see http://www.fao.org/biotech/biotech-forum/ ]
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