Identification and Development of Data Standards for Maize Field Phenotypic Measurements: Working with the GxE Subgroup of the Genomes2Fields Initiative

Data including genotypic, phenotypic, and environmental measurements are used to make breeding decisions that seek to adapt crops for agricultural and industrial uses. Development of data standards is a required first step to facilitate multi-institutional and multi-year data analysis. As with all data standards development projects, working with the user group is key to developing and deploying useful standards. The Genotype by Environment (G X E) project within the Genomes to Fields (G2F) initiative, is seeking to identify, develop, and use data standards that will enable documentation and analysis of relevant phenotypic and environmental information collected by other researchers. Once developed, datasets collected using these standards will be readily analyzed without the added step of data transformation before analysis is possible. This will enable researchers to ask and answer questions that were previously intractable in the public sector.  The G X E project encompasses multiple investigators across 22 locations in 14 states and Canada.  Very broadly stated, one initial goal of the G X E project is to assess environmental effects on the performance of a large collection of inbred lines and hybrids grown in 22 diverse environments across North America. Measurements on 14 core traits, along with weather data and associated metadata were collected and are currently undergoing analysis. In this poster, we present progress on the development of data standards, plans for 2015, and details on our partnership with the iPlant collaborative to facilitate data storage and dissemination both within and beyond the G X E project.