Research at CGN
CGN does research supporting the ex-situ conservation of plant genetic resources. This research concentrates on issues related to the composition of collections and accessibility of those collections.
Molecular markers
In the last decades, the use of DNA markers for the study of crop genetic diversity has become routine, and has revolutionized biology. Increasingly, techniques are being developed to more precisely, quickly and cheaply assess genetic variation, and molecular tools have also found the way to genebanks.
Core collections
Due to the size of, and lack of proper information about many germplasm collections, choosing material is not always easy. Core collections aim at presenting the user with a subset of material that contains as much diversity as possible, given the requirements for this set.
Niche modelling
Predictions about the current and future distribution of crop related wild species are important information to gene banks to: • Guide collecting expeditions of crop wild relatives • Support policy decisions regarding the conservation of crop wild relatives To obtain such predictions for plant species of interest, CGN has started to use niche modelling.