What’s new at the Maize Genetic Cooperation Stock Center

Authors: Gustin Ii, Jeffery; Zimmerman, Shane; Sachs, Martin

Submitted to: Maize Genetics Conference Abstracts
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/8/2025
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: The Maize Stock Center provided the maize genetics community with genetic stocks for nearly a century. During that time, the collection has grown to contain over 42,000 stocks, created by our community and donated to the Stock Center for storage, maintenance and distribution. The following are new or continuing initiatives at the Stock Center to increase the access and utility of the collection to the maize genetics community. New Stock Images – We’ve begun collecting standardized images of all mutant stocks at relevant growth stages including flatbed scans of kernel and cob mutants, sand bed images of seedling mutants and field images of later stage mutants. These are particularly useful for the large number of mutants that have not yet been genetically characterized. The images are currently being used by Stock Center Staff to improve efficiency and ensure line purity, but we plan to make them accessible to the public through MaizeGDB stock record pages. New Allele Tests – The Stock Center contains over 3400 uncharacterized ‘phenotype-only’ mutants. We continue to conduct allele tests between these mutants and well characterized mapped mutants with similar phenotypes. We have focused recently on short stature mutants such as dwarf, brachytic, and nana and have identified novel short stature mutants that are not allelic to mapped mutants as well as alleles of characterized mutants such brachytic2. New BSASeq Pipeline – Advances in short read sequencing have reduced the cost of mapping mutants using Bulk Segregant Analysis sequencing (BSAseq) to a price point that is on par with the cost of traditional field-based methods. With the guiding assistance of publications from Maize scientists, we have implemented a BSAseq pipeline to map phenotype-only mutants for under $200. We are using BSAseq along with traditional allele tests to add genomic position information to the collection of phenotype-only mutants.

Technical Abstract: Staff to improve efficiency and ensure line purity, but we plan to make them accessible to the public through MaizeGDB stock record pages. New Allele Tests – The Stock Center contains over 3400 uncharacterized ‘phenotype-only’ mutants. We continue to conduct allele tests between these mutants and well characterized mapped mutants with similar phenotypes. We have focused recently on short stature mutants such as dwarf, brachytic, and nana and have identified novel short stature mutants that are not allelic to mapped mutants as well as alleles of characterized mutants such brachytic2. New BSASeq Pipeline – Advances in short read sequencing have reduced the cost of mapping mutants using Bulk Segregant Analysis sequencing (BSAseq) to a price point that is on par with the cost of traditional field-based methods. With the guiding assistance of publications from Maize scientists, we have implemented a BSAseq pipeline to map phenotype-only mutants for under $200. We are using BSAseq along with traditional allele tests to add genomic position information to the collection of phenotype-only mutants.