SORGHUM NUTRITIONAL QUALITY

.TABLE OF CONTENTS Opening Session Page Introduction.................... D. W. Thomas 1 Purpose of Conference........................ R. Schaffert 3 The Sorghum Producers Views on Sorghum Quality Improvement..................L.Rooney 6 Importance of Sorghum on a Global Scale.................... B.Maunder 8 Relevance of International Sorghum and Millet Research to U.S. Agriculture................... J. Yohe 1

Sorghum Brown Midrib19 (Bmr19) Gene Links Lignin Biosynthesis to Folate Metabolism

Genetic analysis of brown midrib sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) mutant lines assembled in our program has previously shown that the mutations fall into four allelic groups, bmr2, bmr6, bmr12 or bmr19. Causal genes for allelic groups bmr2, bmr6 and bmr12, have since been identified. In this report, we provide evidence for the nature of the bmr19 mutation. This was accomplished by introgressing each of the four bmr alleles into nine different genetic backgrounds. Polymorphisms from four resequenced bulks of sorghum introgression lines containing either mutation, relative to those of a resequenced bulk of the nine normal midrib recurrent parent lines, were used to locate their respective causal mutations. The analysis confirmed the previously reported causal mutations for bmr2 and bmr6 but failed in the case of bmr12-bulk due to a mixture of mutant alleles at the locus among members of that mutant bulk. In the bmr19-bulk, a common G → A mutation was found among all members in Sobic.001G535500. This gene encodes a putative folylpolyglutamate synthase with high homology to maize Bm4. The brown midrib phenotype co-segregated with this point mutation in two separate F2 populations. Furthermore, an additional variant allele at this locus obtained from a TILLING population also showed a brown midrib phenotype, confirming this locus as Bmr19

Proceedings International Sorghum and Millet CRSP Conference

On behalf of the INTSORMIL Board of Directors, Principal Investigators and the Management Entity Office, it gives me great pleasure this moming to welcome you to this opening session of the 1991 INTSORMIL International SorghumIMlllet CRSP Conference. INTSORMIL initiated the Biennial CRSP conference series in 1983. Attendance has grown with each meeting. Today we have 199 persons registered from 12 States in the U.S. and 27 different countries. There are representatives from three International Agricultural Research Centers (lCRISAT, IFPRI, and ICRISAT), four private seed companies and the U.S. National Grain Sorghum Producers Association (NGSPA). I look around this audience and see new faces and old friends. I see senior sorghum and millet scientists from Africa and ICRISAT. I see senior NARS administrators who value the collaborative research relationship between INTSORM IL and their staff. I see graduate students from around the world. I see INTSORMIL graduates who have accepted major administrative responsibilities in the NARS of their home countries. I see the cream of the crop of developed and developing world sorghum and millet science. We have come to share our ideas and concepts about how to make further contributions to resolution of hunger and poverty In those developing countries where sorghum and millet are major food grain crops

Proceedings of the West African Hybrid Sorghum and Pearl Millet Seed Workshop

Sorghum and pearl millet are the most important cereal crops in West Africa where they provide 70% of total cereal production that provide the major complements in the diets of people in the region. Research progress in the improvement of sorghum and millet is, therefore, of vital importance to the well being of people in West Africa. The Hybrid Sorghum and Pearl Millet Seed Workshop in West Africa is the culmination of the research and development effort by the Institut National de Recherches Agronomiques du Niger (INRAN) , the International Sorghum and Millet Collaborative Research Support Program (INTSORMIL), and the International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-arid Tropics (lCRISAT) during the last 10 years. The workshop served as a forum for documenting experience gained in the development, release, and diffusion of NAD-l as the first commercial sorghum hybrid in Niger. It marked a significant milestone in the history of agriculture for Niger and possibly for West Africa. The workshop brought together sorghum scientists from throughout Africa, the United States, India, and Europe. Mr. B.R. Barwale, the 1998 recipient of the World Food Prize who is credited for laying the foundation of the seed industry in India also attended the meeting and shared his experience with a paper entitled Hybrid Seed Experiences in Developing Countries

Hoosiers’ Health in a Changing Climate: A Report from the Indiana Climate Change Impacts Assessment

In the coming decades, Indiana’s changing climate will bring with it higher temperatures, longer heat waves, more extremely hot days and more frequent extreme storm events. Those changes will affect the health of Hoosiers in every part of the state. This report from the Indiana Climate Change Impacts Assessment (IN CCIA) describes historical and future climate-related health impacts that affect Hoosiers

Proceedings of the International Conference on Genetic Improvement of Sorghum and Pearl Millet

In 1971, an international symposium, Sorghum in the Seventies , organized by the All India Coordinated Sorghum Improvement Project with support from the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the Rockefeller Foundation was held in Hyderabad, India. The symposium reviewed the current knowledge base of the scientific, production and nutritional aspects of sorghum as a crop and as a human food. In 1981, ICRISAT, INTSORMIL, and the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) sponsored Sorghum in the Eighties , an international symposium at ICRISAT Center in India, to review the achievements accomplished in sorghum research during the preceding 10 years. They reviewed sorghum\u27s role as an important cereal food, feed, construction material, and fuel in the developed and developing countries. In 1994, after discussion among INTSORMIL and ICRISAT scientists, it was recognized that an international meeting on the genetic improvement of grain sorghum and pearl millet was needed and would be strongly supported by the international sorghum and millet research community. Those discussions led to the September 1996 International Conference on Genetic Improvement of Sorghum and Pearl Millet. Grain sorghum and pearl millet are major food grains in the semiarid tropics of Africa, India, and South America. Sorghum ranks fifth among the world\u27s cereals, following wheat, maize, rice, and barley. F AO includes all millets together in its production estimates. Current estimates indicate that annual world sorghum production is approximately 61 million metric tons and world millet production is approximately 20 million metric tons. The inaugural speaker of this 1996 conference, Dr. Leland House, indicated global population is projected to increase to nine billion people by the year 2030 and is projected to increase most rapidly in the developing world. This will create a growing demand for food, as well as potential new market opportunities for food products developed from these basic grains

A Large-Scale Genome-Wide Association Analyses of Ethiopian Sorghum Landrace Collection Reveal Loci Associated With Important Traits

The eastern Africa region, Ethiopia and its surroundings, is considered as the center of origin and diversity for sorghum, and has contributed to global sorghum genetic improvement. The germplasm from this region harbors enormous genetic variation for various traits but little is known regarding the genetic architecture of most traits. Here, 1425 Ethiopian landrace accessions were phenotyped under field conditions for presence or absence of awns, panicle compactness and shape, panicle exsertion, pericarp color, glume cover, plant height and smut resistance under diverse environmental conditions in Ethiopia. In addition, F1 hybrids obtained from a subset of 1341 accessions crossed to an A1 cytoplasmic male sterile line, ATx623, were scored for fertility/sterility reactions. Subsequently, genotyping-by-sequencing generated a total of 879,407 SNPs from which 72,190 robust SNP markers were selected after stringent quality control (QC). Pairwise distance-based hierarchical clustering identified 11 distinct groups. Of the genotypes assigned to either one of the 11 sub-populations, 65% had high ancestry membership coefficient with the likelihood of more than 0.60 and the remaining 35% represented highly admixed accessions. A genome-wide association study (GWAS) identified loci and SNPs associated with aforementioned traits. GWAS based on compressed mixed linear model (CMLM) identified SNPs with significant association (FDR ≤ 0.05) to the different traits studied. The percentage of total phenotypic variation explained with significant SNPs across traits ranged from 2 to 43%. Candidate genes showing significant association with different traits were identified. The sorghum bHLH transcription factor, ABORTED MICROSPORES was identified as a strong candidate gene conditioning male fertility. Notably, sorghum CLAVATA1 receptor like kinase, known for regulation of plant growth, and the ETHYLENE RESPONSIVE TRANSCRIPTION FACTOR gene RAP2-7, known to suppress transition to flowering, were significantly associated with plant height. In addition, the YELLOW SEED1 like MYB transcription factor and TANNIN1 showed strong association with pericarp color validating previous observations. Overall, the genetic architecture of natural variation representing the complex Ethiopian sorghum germplasm was established. The study contributes to the characterization of genes and alleles controlling agronomic traits, and will serve as a source of markers for molecular breeding

SELECTION FOR GENETIC MODIFIERS THAT IMPROVE THE OPAQUE KERNEL PHENOTYPE OF P-721, HIGH LYSINE SORGHUM (SORGHUM BICOLOR (L.) MOENCH).

Abstract not availabl