Research is taking the natural path to salt tolerant wheat

Wheat breeders are heading back to the genetic drawing board in Western Australia, attempting to find a gene for salt tolerance within the natural variation of the species.

In a newly established role, Professor Rudi Appels has been employed jointly by the Department of Agriculture WA and the State Agricultural Biotechnology Centre at Murdoch University to bring field and molecular wheat researchers together.

"Thanks to researchers around the world, we have a genetic map for wheat to work from," said Professor Appels.

"Now that we have this knowledge base, we can start looking for interesting genes with molecular marker technology."

Molecular markers highlight particular genes so researchers can track their movement through breeding generations.

Genes control many desirable factors of wheat, and a gene for salt tolerance is the latest target for the WA research collaboration.

"Wheat as we know it was made from a cross between durum wheat, which is used to make pasta, and a wild straggling strain still found from Turkey to Afghanistan.

"This cross-pollination would only have occurred a few times, making a bottleneck for the flow through of genetic variation.

"In Mexico, they are re-crossing the two original wheat strains to produce a wealth of new genetic variation in modern wheat.

"If we can find a salt tolerance gene within this new spread of genetic material, we will be able to produce a strain of salt tolerant modern wheat without relying on the random chance inherent in selected breeding."

Professor Appels said the advantage of molecular technology in modern agriculture is that breeders can produce a strain with all the desirable characteristics of parent A and just take the one desirable characteristic of parent B.

Breeders can also test the plants for the wanted genes by looking for genetic markers rather than waiting for the samples to grow, which will speed up the rate of research.

"By using marker assisted breeding, we can cut our research time down significantly," said Professor Appels.

The team is working closely with researchers at the University of WA and is funded by the Grain Research and Development Council.