NSF NPGI Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2014

本行动资助2014财年美国国家科学基金会国家植物基因组计划生物学博士后研究奖学金。该奖学金支持奖学金获得者在主办实验室的研究和培训计划，该奖学金获得者还提出了扩大生物学参与的计划。John T. Lovell的研究和培训计划的标题是“确定Panicum禾草杂种优势和无融合的基因组基础”。该奖学金的主办机构是德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校，赞助科学家是托马斯·荣格博士。Dan Rohksar（美国能源部联合基因组研究所），Jeremy Schmutz（哈德逊-阿尔法生物技术公司）和Timothy Sharbel（德国IPK-Gatersleben）。培训目标包括生物信息学、定量遗传学和生理学。更广泛的影响包括发展本科指导计划和纳入代表性不足的群体。为了满足未来不断增长的人口的需求，必须提高粮食和生物燃料生产的效率。实现这一目标的一种广泛成功的机制是杂交育种。研究人员通过增加杂交后代的生长和繁殖（杂种优势），极大地提高了玉米、油菜和许多其他粮食作物的产量。然而，这些成功还没有在柳枝稷和其他柳枝稷纤维素生物燃料作物中实现，尽管有证据表明它们具有高水平的杂种优势。本研究将通过以下两个目标为实现柳枝稷杂交育种目标提供框架：1)利用基因组工具确定柳枝稷及其相关物种杂种优势的遗传基础；2)评估通过诱导无性繁殖（无融合）来固定杂种优势的可行性。

This action funds an NSF National Plant Genome Initiative Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2014. The fellowship supports a research and training plan in a host laboratory for the Fellow who also presents a plan to broaden participation in biology. The title of the research and training plan for this fellowship to John T. Lovell is "Determining the genomic basis of heterosis and apomixis in Panicum grasses". The host institution for the fellowship is the University of Texas, Austin and the sponsoring scientist is Dr. Thomas Juenger with collaborators Drs. Dan Rohksar (DOE Joint Genome Institute), Jeremy Schmutz (HudsonAlpha Biotechnology) and Timothy Sharbel (IPK-Gatersleben, Germany). Training objectives include bioinformatics, quantitative genetics and physiology. Broader impacts include the development of undergraduate mentoring programs and the inclusion of underrepresented groups.To meet the future needs of a growing population, the efficiency of both food and biofuel production must be improved. One widely successful mechanism to accomplish this goal is hybrid breeding. Researchers have greatly improved yield in maize, canola and many other food crops by taking advantage of increased growth and reproduction of hybrid offspring (heterosis). However, these successes have not been realized in switchgrass and other lingo-cellulose biofuel crops despite evidence of high levels of heterosis. Research conducted through the tenure of this fellowship will provide a framework to achieve hybrid breeding goals in switchgrass by addressing two objectives: 1) to determine the genetic basis of heterosis in switchgrass and related species using genomic tools, and 2) to assess the feasibility to fixing heterosis across generations through the induction of asexual seed production (apomixis).