Skip to main content
ARS Home » Northeast Area » Ithaca, New York » Robert W. Holley Center for Agriculture & Health » Plant, Soil and Nutrition Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #436601
Research Project: Championing Improvement of Sorghum and Other Agriculturally Important Species through Data Stewardship and Functional Dissection of Complex Traits

Location: Plant, Soil and Nutrition Research

Title: SorghumBase: A FAIR and Community-Driven Resource for Sorghum Genomics, Germplasm, and AI-Ready Data Integration

Author
item KUMARI, SUNITA - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item Gladman, Nicholas
item OLSON, ANDREW - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item CHOUGULE, KAPEEL - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item LU, ZHEYUAN - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item OLSON, AUDRA - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item WEI, SHARON - Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
item Ware, Doreen

Submitted to: American Society of Plant Biologists Annual Meeting
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/18/2026
Publication Date: 7/18/2026
Citation: Kumari, S., Gladman, N.P., Olson, A., Chougule, K., Lu, Z., Olson, A., Wei, S., Ware, D. 2026. SorghumBase: A FAIR and Community-Driven Resource for Sorghum Genomics, Germplasm, and AI-Ready Data Integration. American Society of Plant Biologists Annual Meeting. The American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB) Plant Biology 2026 Conference.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: SorghumBase (https://www.sorghumbase.org) is a USDA-ARS-funded genomics and breeding resource that supports the global sorghum research community through data stewardship, community engagement, and implementation of FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) data principles. Since its public release in 2021, SorghumBase has worked closely with researchers to establish best practices for managing sorghum genomic data, facilitate data integration and standardization, and provide opportunities for networking, training, and capacity building. Currently, SorghumBase hosts 116 sorghum genome assemblies, including 31 newly integrated Sorghum bicolor genomes generated by the Joint Genome Institute. Comparative genomic analyses include 49,455 protein-coding gene family trees constructed from more than 2.4 million gene models representing 68 sorghum and eight outgroup genomes. To improve reproducibility and interoperability, standard SNP identifiers (rsIDs) assigned by the European Variation Archive have been projected from the BTx623 v3 reference genome to 100 additional sorghum assemblies, enabling genetic variants and traits to be tracked across a pan-genome framework. Enhanced germplasm tools now allow users to explore accessions carrying predicted loss-of-function variants organized by study, variant type, and zygosity. SorghumBase integrates curated datasets from Gene Expression Atlas, eFPseq Browser, Plant Reactome, and the OZ Sorghum QTL Atlas, while maintaining a searchable collection of more than 1,500 sorghum publications, research projects, community news, and training resources. Team members actively contribute to AgBioData working groups focused on biocuration, natural language processing, and AI readiness. Together, these efforts strengthen community standards, support FAIR data stewardship, and establish a foundation for AI-enabled discovery and crop improvement.