The need, as indicated by stakeholders:

This project addresses the Food Production, Food Security and Horticulture issues under the Sustainable Production Systems in the Western Agenda recently released by Western Association of Agricultural Experiment Station Directors. Agricultural production in the Western Region involves more than 400 plant species and contributes almost one-quarter to the total U.S. farm gate value or $87.7 billion. Researchers in both public and private sectors, primarily in land grant universities in the western region, have played, and will continue to play a critically important role in the development of robust agricultural and natural resource economies. Improving the current crop varieties or developing new crop varieties relies on available plant genetic resources acquired throughout the world and managed by the National Plant Germplasm System (NPGS). Plant researchers in the western region have requested a large number of accessions from NPGS to use in both basic and applied research. As a crucial component of the NPGS, this project manages the genetic resources of cool season food and forage legumes, grasses, common beans, oilseeds, vegetables, beets, ornamentals, medicinal crops and related wild species. These introduced plant genetic resources harbor valuable genes or alleles for researchers and breeders to improve crop productivity for food security, to develop new varieties, to breed cultivars with improved resistance to diseases and pests and with resilience to environmental stresses such as drought and temperature extremes associated with climate change. The stakeholders and customers for this project include researchers, plant breeders, educators, and commercial producers in the western states, in the U.S. and throughout the world. In the past seven years (2008-2014), researchers within the western region used a total of 47,069 packets of seed samples from this project in various research, education and extension activities. The extensive use of the available plant genetic resources managed by this project contribute to new knowledge of plant science generated by basic studies and to increased agricultural productivity resulting from improved crop varieties and new crops developed by applied plant breeding.

The importance of the work, and what the consequences are if it is not done:

According to United Nations estimates, the global population is predicated to increase by 2.4 billion by 2050, with the U.S. population increasing 21% to approximately 389 million. This, along with warmer temperatures and disrupted precipitation patterns associated with climate change, presents a food security challenge that will require breeding crop cultivars that are more productive in less favorable environments. In response, scientists and breeders are mining genes that confer resistances to pathogens and pests and tolerance to abiotic stresses from existing plant genetic resources. U.S. scientists and breeders rely on introduced germplasm to provide new genes to improve major crops, minor regional crops, and to develop new crops. Access to germplasm is thus a critical need. This project “Management and Utilization of Plant Genetic Resources and Associated Information” plays a vital role in conserving and providing needed genetic resources for numerous crop species to support such endeavors.

As of September 30, 2015, this project manages a total of 97,219 accessions collected worldwide. Assigned plant species, both cultivated crops and their wild relatives, represent 1,133 genera, 4,996 species and 5,690 taxa. Almost all of the seed samples are available upon request for research, education and extension purposes. The value of these collections continues to grow as international access to germplasm is increasingly limited by political and environmental factors, and scientists continue to develop new tools that enable them to identify valuable traits within the collection.

This collection has had enormous impact on agriculture in the U.S., and especially in the western states, where many of these crop species are economically important. For example, alfalfa is the fourth largest crop grown in the U.S., behind corn, soybeans, and wheat. According to the USDA Crop Statistics, more than 53 million metric tons of alfalfa, worth over $10 billion, was produced on more than 7 million hectares in the U.S. in 2012. More than one-third of that was in the western states. The alfalfa collection has more than 50,000 evaluation data entries and has been extensity utilized. A pedigree analysis of 500 U.S. alfalfa varieties found that 245 or 69% of these varieties had one or more parents that could be traced to a PI accession in the temperate forage legume collection managed by this project. Another example is lettuce, second only to potato in term of per capita consumption in the U.S. with annual production value exceeding $2 billion. Two western states, California and Arizona, account for 96% of U.S. lettuce production. The lettuce collection of both wild and cultivated accessions has been screened extensively for disease resistance and other favorable traits to improve and sustain the production of this crop. Cool season food legumes (chickpea, pea, and lentil) are major crops in Washington and Idaho. The recent booming chickpea industry is supported by cultivars developed from the germplasm collection managed by this project. Our collection of native plant species ensures the availability of native species needed for the revegetation and ecosystem restoration for the inter-mountain west. In addition to the Western States, the W6 project fills germplasm needs nationwide, such as the lentil industry in North Dakota, beans in Michigan and many other states, and forage and turf grasses throughout the Midwest and Atlantic states.

U.S. agriculture is based on plant species many of which are not indigenous to this country. It is hard to picture what the U.S. food production system would be without the introduced plant genetics resources. Almost all the major crops of commercial importance would not exist. Just to improve existing crops, researchers would have to travel afar to the centers of origin or centers of diversity of each specific crop to collect needed germplasm. Nowadays, many areas or countries are not easily accessible for various reasons. The majority of landraces of many crops are no longer available in many agricultural areas as they have been steadily replaced by modern varieties. The natural habitats of many crop wild relatives have disappeared through the destruction and degradation of natural environments or their conversion to other uses. The management and conservation of the worldwide collected crop genetic resources in NPGS must be continued for the use by researchers and educators of the current and future generations.

This project also provides needed germplasm to researchers producing high-impact scientific results with practical application. There is no better example than purple false brome, Brachypodium distachyon (L.) Beauv. This grass has a small stature, a rapid life cycle, and most importantly, a small genome evolutionarily similar to important cereal crops like wheat and barley. In 2001 this little known grass species was proposed as a model plant for studying grass functional genomics. Functional genes discovered in this model plant have had immediate applications to the genetic improvement of food (wheat) and energy (switchgrass) crops. In February 2010, the complete genomic DNA sequence of this grass was published in the journal Nature. The sequenced diploid inbred line was derived from an accession (PI 254867), that was collected from Iraq and maintained in WRPIS since 1959. Since 2001, WRPIS has distributed seed samples of this PI to over 150 requesters in more than 20 countries. A search with Google Scholar shows over 6,500 published research papers using this model plant (http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Brachypodium+distachyon+&hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C48&as_ylo=2001&as_yhi). These published results greatly increase our understanding of basic plant molecular biology from gene function, the regulation of gene expression to genome organization and evolution.

The technical feasibility of the research:

The Agricultural Research Center, the College of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences of Washington State University (WSU) provides required farm land for regeneration, seed increase, phenotypic evaluation and genetic enhancement of germplasm on three research farms at Pullman, WA, Central Ferry, WA and Prosser, WA. Each site provides suitable climate conditions to respective plant species. Standard cultivation practices have been developed by dedicated and experienced staff for specific plant species and genera. USDA-Agricultural Research Service completed an expensive retrofit of the existing seed storage facilities on the WSU campus in 2014 that resulted in a much better insulation of the seed storage space so it is adequate for proper conservation of seed samples for short and medium term storage. However, the storage space is almost full, and we are exploring how to expand storage to house our growing collection. The National Center for Genetic Resources Preservation, Fort Collins, Colorado and the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, Svalbard, Norway are available for security back-up and long-term storage of our collections. The Internet-based Genetic Resource Information Network (GRIN) database connects our managed accessions and associated information with our users. We receive excellent technical support from the USDA-ARS Database Management Unit, Beltsville, Maryland to ensure researchers and breeding programs have updated access to GRIN for searching and requesting needed genetic resources for research and education purposes.

The advantages for doing the work as a multistate effort:

Over the past 68 years, this project has been supported through a joint partnership, designated as the Multistate Research Project W-006, between the USDA-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) and the Western State Agricultural Experiment Stations (WSAES). Although the germplasm collection managed by this project has national and international significance, most of the species are important crops in the western states. The full potential of certain germplasm accessions can only be realized when they are evaluated under particular conditions, many of which could be found in the broad geographic expanse of the Western Region. Our stakeholders and customers include professors, professional researchers and breeders in public universities, private companies, non-profit organizations and government agencies. The multistate effort allows an effective interaction between our germplasm curatorial staff and the user community. The germplasm collection managed by this project is covered by eleven crop specific Crop Germplasm Committees (CGC) whose members consist of state, federal, and private researchers that meet either annually or biennially to provide guidance for plant genetic resource acquisition, conservation, management, and distribution. More importantly, the W6 Regional Technical Advisory Committee (RTAC) has dedicated representatives from each participating state and meets annually to assess the need and the status of the conservation and utilization of the plant genetic resources and associated information managed by this project.

What the likely impacts will be from successfully completing the work:

This project will provide a continuous supply of critically needed high quality germplasm samples to the plant research community in the Western region, in the U.S. as well as in foreign countries, for scientific research and product development. Phenotypic evaluation and genomic characterization provided by this project will enable breeders to more efficiently identify and utilize germplasm with desirable traits and alleles for improvement in both quality and productivity of crop species. Marker-assisted selection has been a powerful tool for expediting the process of genetic improvement for many crop species. This project will generate information on marker-trait associations and identify user-friendly DNA markers for breeders to use. Genetically enhanced breeding lines developed through this project will speed the development of new cultivars with desirable agronomic traits and improved resistance to diseases and abiotic stresses. The germplasm samples distributed from this project will contribute to the genetic improvement of the quality and productivity of crop plants to ensure that U.S. agriculture remains viable and competitive and for feeding the growing world population.