JIC

To find out how valuable it is, Simon Griffiths, a geneticist at JIC, wanted to sequence the genomes of the landraces and chart the novel genetic diversity they contained.

The genome data arrived at JIC in a suitcase full of hard drives, Griffiths recalls.

So the team created crosses from JIC’s seed collection, resulting in 6762 unique populations.

And in India, the source of 128 landraces in the collection, researchers at Punjab Agricultural University are working to improve disease resistance with seeds they acquired from JIC.

She still works at the JIC and her project was restarted.