Fine Tuning of Recombination in Barley

In crops such as wheat or barley, the distribution of chiasmata is markedly skewed towards the telomere, meaning that a considerable proportion of the genome rarely recombines. An ability to modify the pattern of recombination in these species could therefore have profound impact on the breeding of the crops. Here we report some results from a number of meiotic mutants and their effects on gene recombination.