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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Madison, Wisconsin » U.S. Dairy Forage Research Center » Dairy Forage Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #352922
Title: Breeding progress and preparedness for upscaling of perennial lignocellulosic biomass crops switchgrass, miscanthus, willow and poplar

Author
item CLIFTON-BROWN, JOHN - Aberystwyth University
item Casler, Michael
item HARFOUCHE, ANTOINE - University Of Tuscia
item MURPHY-BOKERN, DONAL - Cranfield University
item JONES, HUW - Aberystwyth University
item SACKS, ERIK - University Of Illinois
item TAYLOR, GAIL - University Of Southampton
item ZALESNY, RON - Us Forest Service (FS)
item LEWANDOWSKI, IRIS - University Of Hohenheim

Submitted to: Global Change Biology Bioenergy
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 9/20/2018
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Perennial biomass crops are an effective mechanism to produce large quantities of biomass for conversion to energy in a sustainable manner. Four crops - switchgrass, miscanthus, poplar, and willow - are undergoing intensive and extensive efforts to create commercial hybrids and varieties to support a biomass-based bio-economy. All four crops are supported by several field-based breeding programs that employ extensive testing networks, and by well-funded laboratory programs that involve extensive groups of collaborators with complementary skills in molecular technologies and in the management of massively large data sets. These data sets include both plant traits and DNA marker information and are being used to employ the most modern and high-technology breeding methods available. All four crops are undergoing plant improvement efforts in North America, while all but switchgrass are undergoing similar efforts in Europe, often with cross-continent collaborations. Plant improvement efforts have a long-term focus to ensure that commercial hybrids and varieties will be available when market forces demand an increase in biomass supply.

Technical Abstract: Genetic improvement through breeding is one of the keys to increasing biomass supply. This paper documents the breeding progress to date for four perennial biomass crops with high output-input energy ratios: namely Panicum viratum (switchgrass), and species of the genera Miscanthus (miscanthus), Salix (willow) and Populus (poplar). For each species or genus, we report on the size of germplasm collections, the efforts to date to phenotype and genotype the diversity available for breeding, and the scale of breeding work as indicated by number of attempted deliberate crosses. In all crops, progeny selections in field trials are made for further breeding cycles and a few outstanding progeny are promoted to replicated plot trials to benchmark yield performance relative to current leading commercial hybrid cultivars. We report on the development of molecular breeding methods for faster and more precise breeding. Poplar is the model tree for genetic studies and is furthest ahead in terms of biological knowledge. Linkage maps, transgenics and gene editing methods are now being used in commercial poplar breeding. These methods are undergoing development in switchgrass, miscanthus and willow. Conventional and molecular breeding programs create huge genetic and phenotypic datasets, which require concomitant informatics to create summaries that can be accessed and used by practical breeders. Cultivars of switchgrass and miscanthus can be seed based synthetic populations, semi-hybrids or clones. Willow and poplar cultivars are clones. These species vary in their readiness for scaling-up with respect to propagation and the development of supporting agronomic techniques. Public investments in breeding are focused on long-term investments to ensure that mass-scale deployment of commercial cultivars will be feasible when demanded by market forces.