Developing a Toolkit for Barley Genebank Genomics

Genomics and biodiversity informatics are rising as fundamental tools to harness genetic resources harbored in germplasm collections, an essential albeit mostly untapped reservoirs of genetic diversity for crop research and improvement. The BRIDGE project aims to molecularly characterize more than 20,000 accessions of domesticated (Hordeum vulgare L. subsp. vulgare) and wild (Hordeum vulgare L. subsp. spontaneum) barley hosted at the German ex situ genebank at IPK Gatersleben, by means of a genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) approach. The data are being analyzed in context of the barley genomic framework to study genetic diversity and population structure, gaining an insight on the historical flow of pedigree haplotypes during breeding practices. The outcoming genome diversity catalog will enable a more informed classification of genebank accessions based on non-redundant molecular passports. Moreover, a novel warehouse infrastructure will provide a systematic valorization of the upcoming genomics data and a link to the passport and phenotypic data accumulated by the IPK genebank conservation management. First results of the GBS analysis conducted on more than 10,000 barley accessions will be presented.