Abstract - Genomic selection (GS) is a marker-based method to select superior seedlings. In forest trees, GS is expected to result in rapid genetic gains by reducing the breeding cycles and increasing the selection intensity. There are several GS studies in forest trees demonstrating high accuracy of marker-based predictions. In all these studies, a large number of families with a few individuals per family were used. The accuracy of GS models reported in these studies is mainly due to capturing across family variation rather than within-family variation. Accuracy of GS is influenced by the genetic relationships and the marker-trait associations captured by the markers. In breeding populations with large number of families, accuracy of GS is mainly due to the genomic relationships captured by the markers. However, the accuracy of GS within-families is mainly influenced by the marker-trait associations captured by the markers as differences in genetic relationships between the individuals within a family are small. For forward selections among sibs, markers that capture LD or marker-trait associations are essential. While there are many studies on application of GS across many families, there are few studies exploring the application of GS within large families. Application of GS within-families is useful for identification of superior individuals within large families for deployment through vegetative propagation. We conducted a study to explore the accuracies of within-family GS using several large full-sib families of Eucalyptus globulus. Results from this study will be discussed in this talk.

Biography

Bala Thumma: Bala got his PhD from the University of Queensland and is currently working as a Principal Scientist at Gondwana Genomics a recently formed start-up company catering to the needs of plant and tree breeding community. Previously Bala worked as a Research Scientist at CSIRO for over 13 years. Bala’s main areas of research are association studies and genomic selection.

Saro Thavamanikumar: Saro is a Senior Scientist and head of operations at Gondwana Genomics. Saro got his PhD from the University of Melbourne and his research interests include tree population genetics, molecular genetics, genomics, association studies and genomic selection.