TIFTON —
Between high volumes of irrigation and frequent pesticides use, farming peanuts can be a costly endeavor.
Peggy Ozias-Akins believes peanut breeding is a tool that can help thwart high-priced threats to Georgia’s peanut crop. It’s already aided producers in fighting nematodes.
“Crop improvement through breeding is one of the ultimate goals (for crop production). Traditional breeding now can be facilitated bymolecular genetics. The more we know about how the DNA sequence is actually related to the different traits that are expressed in the crop, then we can proceed with breeding at a greater pace,” said Ozias-Akins, a professor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences on the Tifton Campus.
Ozias-Akins uses molecular markers that are associated with particular crop traits.
“One set of molecular markers we know of is linked with nematode resistance, and we can use these markers to select for plants that we now predict will be nematode resistant,” she said. “The goal is to be able to do that with a much larger number of traits.”
See Saturday's edition for more details.
Local News
Related Photos
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These peanuts are being bred at a greenhouse on the Tifton Campus of the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. Submitted photo
March 15, 2013
Scientists working to improve peanuts
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