EPH Elimination from Malting Barley for Scotch Whisky Production

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In the food and drink industry ethyl carbamate is a strictly regulated compound. To ensure minimal levels are produced during whisky distillation, only EPH non-producing barley varieties are recommended to the industry, EPH being the precursor for ethyl carbamate. The James Hutton Institute (JHI) in Dundee and the Scotch Whisky Research Institute (SWRI) in Edinburgh are teaming up to develop a new molecular marker that can be used by breeders to ensure all newly released commercial distilling barley varieties are EPH non-producers. We will use state-of-the-art sequencing approaches to develop a high throughput assay that can be fully integrated into commercial breeding programmes. Increasing the integrity and throughput will allow highly efficient screening, increasing potential to assay more individuals from diverse germplasm sources, earlier in the selection process. Ultimately this will result in a greater number of suitable candidate barley varieties, with higher agronomical and processing qualities for malting and distilling industries.