USDA's New Sugarcane Crossing Complex

Today, I finally had a chance to get a close look at our brand new crossing complex, made up of a 6-bay photoperiod facility (PF)(Pic 1); a 3-compartment crossing facility (XF) (Pic 2); 12 mobile crossing carts of which four can be rolled from the PF into the XF; and finally an isolation pad (Pic 3). I was excited, in part, because I had a lot to do with its design. The concept behind the crossing facility is novel in the sense that it does not follow the model of any other sugarcane crossing facility in the world that I am aware of. To see something that you and your associates draft on paper actually come to fruition and exceed your expectations is very exciting indeed. There are bugs to be worked out, but all in all, I couldn't have been more pleased with the outcome.

Tomorrow, Argus will be showing us how to use all of the controls. The 3-compartment XF has 1) a room for rolling in two-sets of carts (= 4 carts) with sugarcane plants on them, 2) a crossing room where crosses are arranged and fertilization occurs in one of 99 isolation cubicles (Pic 4), and 3) a maturation room where tassels are maintained while being somewhat isolated from one another until the seed fully matures and can eventually be harvested from the tassel (Pic 5).

In the past, our seed production has varied greatly from year to year, ranging from roughly 100,000 to 1,000,000 seeds. With the much greater temperature control, we should be able to maintain optimum conditions for pollen production. I anticipate much better seed production from now on, and will be disappointed if we cannot consistently produce at least 1,000,000 viable seeds per year from now on.

By the way, if you look at the greenhouse (XF), you will notice the super-structure that supports it. It was designed to withstand the wind force of a Cat 4 hurricane, as I understand.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Borlaug dies

While Patrick Swayze's death got far more press, my attention was directed at the passing of a giant of a man, Norman Borlaug, one of the most influentual plant breeders who ever lived. Borlaug was given the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his role in helping to feed a hungry world through the development of short-stature wheat (Mexico) and rice (India) varieties, that had resulted in a dramatic yield in these two crops. He is widely regarded as the father of the Green Revolution. His contributions, and the recognition he got for his work, had more to do with my decision to pursue a career in plant breeding than any other single consideration. Borlaug is credited with saving the lives of hundreds of millions of people. He worked tirelessly up to his death at age 95, promoting the causes he believed strongly in. One of the statements attributed to Borlaug that left an indelible impression on me during graduate school at the University of Minnesota (coincidentally the same school Borlaug graduated from), was when he was asked what made such a successful plant breeder, he retorted, "I let the plants talk to me." He later explained that what he meant by this was that, as a breeder, he didn't sit behind a desk, or let subordinates do the "dirty work" involved in doing selection...he was out there doing the work himself, which allowed him to develop impressions of what plant characteristics were important in improving yield. This message was especially in parts of the developing world where if you had an advanced degree, that was supposed to mean that you never had to get your hands dirty again.

Making sugarcane crosses for Louisiana at Canal Point, Florida

Every year, in early December sugarcane breeders in Louisiana go to Florida to make genetic crosses. The seed will mature in Florida and be returned to Louisiana to begin a 12-year selection process that ultimately culminates in the development of new, higher yielding, disease and insect resistant varieties. The breeding activity occurs at the USDA Sugarcane Field Station at Canal Point, Florida, on the southeast corner of Lake Okeechobee. Temperatures are moderated by this large lake, so this is a good location to have a sugarcane breeding facility within the continental U.S., where sugarcane naturally flowers outdoors. A blowup of the above picture captured from from Google Earth shows the very large and narrow crossing house where the crosses are made. Parents designated to be used as females are maintained outdoors; night temperatures below 60 F will kill the pollen they produce, and thus cause the outdoor plants to be largely male sterile. Parents designated to be used as males are maintained on a very long rail cart, which gets rolled out of the crossing house every morning (so we have room to make crosses indoors inside cubicles on both sides of the building), then rolled inside the crossing house every evening so that they are kept warm at night. The crossing activity in Florida is aimed at making commercial crosses for both the Florida and Louisiana sugarcane industries. Our people have been in Florida over the past two weeks; I will be going down this week. We do make crosses at Houma, Louisiana on a smaller scale, but most of the locally made crosses are designed to introgress highly desirable traits from wild canes into a commercial background. Examples of desirable traits from the wild canes include improved vigor, cold tolerance, stalk population, and stubbling ability.

Genetic Improvement of Bioenergy Crops

Dr. Wilfred Vermerris, Associate Professor at the Genetics Institute and Agronomy department at the University of Florida in Gainesville, FL, edited a book entitled, "Genetic Improvement of Bioenergy Crops," that was published by Springer. Dr. Vermerris invited me to write the chapter on energy cane, which I agreed to do. I entitled the chapter, "Genetic Improvement of Sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) as an Energy Crop." Robert Cobill, formerly on the staff of the USDA Sugarcane Research Laboratory in Houma, LA, is co-author. The book is out now, and available through Amazon. Dr. Vermerris will be using this as his textbook when he teaches a course on the same subject.

Monsanto acquires major Brazilian sugarcane breeding program

Monsanto has expanded its interests in Brazilian agriculture with the acquisition of CanaVialis and Alellyx. Acquisition of CanaVialis will make Monsanto the proud owner of the largest private sugarcane breeding program in the world. With this deal, Monsanto will also acquire Alellyx, a genomics company founded by Brazilian scientists that has already partnered with CanaVialis toward the development of Bt/Roundup Ready sugarcane varieties; and and development of varieties that are sweeter, more energy efficient, more drought tolerant and so on through genetic modification. I suspect they plan to find and further modify organisms capable of fixing nitrogen in sugarcane, since it is already known that such organisms exist. Brazil is far and away the largest sugarcane-based ethanol producer, though there are other countries who are following their lead, most notably India and Colombia.

Preserving Crop Diversity

I just returned from my trip to Colorado. The meeting I attended with the other Crop Germplasm Committee Chairs was quite enlightening...much more so than the previous one I attended two years ago. Considerable emphasis was placed on maintaining crop germplasm in collections around the country, and making the Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN) system that describes all of this germplasm more user friendly to those who have a vested interest in it. The GRIN system will be completely overhauled over the next few years, and will become the gold standard for describing germplasm in collections throughout the world. When the overhaul is completed, GRIN will become "GRIN Global." In the USA, within the National Plant Germplasm System, there are several locations where the USDA-ARS maintains collections, each location emphasizing those crop species that make the most sense for that particular location. The National Seed Storage Laboratory that we had the opportunity to take a tour of, which is located on the CSU Campus in Ft. Collins, is all about long-term storage at very cold temperatures. You may be aware of an ambitious effort to preserve germplasm in the event of a doomsday scenerio in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault located in a remote part of Norway above the Artic Circle. This project, which is under the auspices of the Global Crop Diversity Fund, was recently reported on by CBS (60 Minutes, see expandable 12-minute video which the Global Crop Diversity Fund website links to). The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation contributed to this project in a substantial way, as did some other organizations. As a side note, it is actually rather startling how much money this Foundation has contributed toward agricultural research, such as the $26.8 million it is giving Cornell University to find resistance to a very threatening wheat rust disease that has potentially devastating consequences on the world food supply, considering wheat's amazingly large role toward feeding mankind. It was pointed out at the meeting that the USDA-ARS often does not get the recognition it deserves in preserving the wide diversity of seed that it has historically preserved. We probably need to make ourselves more visible. If we feel we are underfunded, we have a responsibility to make the public more aware of what we have accomplished in the way of preserving germplasm, and communicating our needs to those who can make a difference.

Being a Sugarcane Breeder on the Bayou

There aren't that many sugarcane breeders in the country, so when the opportunity was given to me to return to my profession, this time in southern Louisiana, I was very grateful. Having been underemployed for several years has given me a whole different perspective, and a healthy appreciation for how fortunate I am to even have a professional position. I think everyone ought to have the experience of being underemployed for a few years.

Sugarcane culture in Louisiana is so completely different than in Hawaii, that we might as well be talking about two completely different crops. When I first moved to Hawaii, the crop was grown anywhere from 2 to 4 years before it was harvested. The crop consisted of a mass of stalks that formed a mat usually about waist deep that would be almost impossible to walk through. The older stalks, if carefully untangled from the mat, would often be in the range of 30 feet in length. The crop was harvested with a so-called push rake, which is a large bulldozer with tines on the front. The cane was pushed into windrows and lifted with a crane into massive cane haul trucks with rows of chains on the bottom to hold the cane in place (and allow the dirt clumps and rocks to fall through) while the load was taken to the mill. The crop in Hawaii is essentially a year-around crop, so planting and harvesting is continually going on, and the crop age is variable as is easily seen from the air.

By contrast, the cane crop in Louisiana doesn't really start growing much until early April, and yet, less than 6 months later is being harvested. The harvest season is generally from late Sep to Dec 31, basically making it a 6 to 9 month crop. Harvesting is done with a chopper harvester, the cane being cut into billets less than 1 ft long. To achieve flowering in Louisiana, the desired parents must undergo a photoperiod treatment, being moved in and out of dark chambers, following a precise day-night regime for a 3-month period that changes by 1 min per day to simulate what would occur in a more tropical environment. In such a limited space to accomodate breeding canes, individual tassels are more highly prized in Louisiana than in Hawaii. When I first moved to Louisiana, I couldn't even relate to the concept of tassel-use-efficiency. Now I understand.

Selection traits not so important in Hawaii that are much more important on the bayou, include the following: stalk erectness until late into the season, rapid sucrose accumulation, stubbling ability (to get several seasons of growth with one planting), stalk freeze tolerance, below-ground winter survival, and early spring vigor. As stated before, it's almost like working with two entirely different crops.

Being a Sugarcane Breeder in Hawaii

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to become a sugarcane breeder when I graduated from a Midwestern university. But Judy was from northern Idaho, and really wanted to be close to mountains. Major agronomic crops and mountains are pretty much incompatible. I promised her I would look on the "open positions board," and tell her every job that was remotely close to mountains. I came home one evening and told her in a not very serious tone, "There is a job in Hawaii, and Hawaii has mountains." She said, "What about checking it out?" I said, "Judy, Hawaii is a place where you go on vacation, not a place where you work." To make a long story short, the more I looked into it, the more interesting the job sounded. Sugarcane was at that time, by far the most important crop in Hawaii. As it turned out, the next 16 years were the most idyllic of my life. As I look back, I can't believe how grossly I under-appreciated how nice the job was that I had in Hawaii. While she was on vacation in Hawaii, I took my older sister, Carolyn, to our breeding station in the Maunawili Valley on the windward side of Oahu, which is recognized as possibly the most free-flowering location on the planet for making sugarcane crosses.

When she finished her vacation, she told me that this location was her favorite, of all the places we took her. Having worked there for several years, I had reached the point of having taken it for granted. Being a sugarcane breeder has its challenges, not the least of which is to get different varieties to flower...and flower at the same time, so that genetic crosses can be made. But the development of just one new variety 10% higher yielding than the mainstay variety, was worth tens of millions of dollars to the industry annually, so the industry was getting a good return on its $6 million /year investment into research (1977 dollars), much of which was directed at the breeding program. Today, with only two sugar plantations remaining in Hawaii, much has changed. I left sugarcane research in 1990, installed turfgrass on new golf courses until 1993, then left Hawaii altogether with many fond memories.

Being a Plant Breeder

Personal comments about my profession as a plant geneticist. When I attended graduate school at the University of Minnesota from 1972-1977, the term "plant geneticist" was not as commonly used as was the term "plant breeder." Molecular genetics was at that time taught as a botany or biochemistry course. The primary training for future plant breeders interested in the genetic improvement of agronomic and horticultural crops was in quantitative or statistical genetics, rather than in molecular genetics. Professors were primarily field-oriented, rather than lab oriented. Fast forward to today, 30 years later, it is readily apparent that traditional plant breeders are becoming scarce, at least in public institutions. Most position openings today in plant genetics are for lab-oriented molecular geneticists. Those of us oriented toward quantitative genetics, who studied traits in the field, rather than in a laboratory or greenhouse, have had to adapt, at least to the point of being familiar with molecular genetics terminology, in order to remain relevant.

Above is a pic of me working together with a molecular geneticist in Louisiana, interpreting the output from a DNA analysis (microsatellite markers) of progeny from a sugarcane cross, deciding which progeny should be planted to the field for selection purposes, and which should be discarded straight away.