South Dakota State University, SD
08-15-06
SDSU lands major research award
South DakotaStateUniversity has landed a major research award that will help grape growers everywhere.
South Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station Director Dr. John Kirby said SDSU professor Anne Fennell, a molecular biologist specializing in woody plants, assembled a team from SDSU and three other universities that won a $3 million grant from the National Science Foundation. Fennell is the principal investigator.
SDSU will be the lead institution in the study and will use about $1.2 million of the grant to carry out its part of the study. The project examines the biological mechanisms involved when grapes enter or break dormancy. The research will promote advances in selecting and breeding grapes for different climates and will also lead to improved practices for managing dormancy in existing grape cultivars.
Other investigators working with Fennell in the project are Karen Schlauch, of BostonUniversity; Grant Cramer, of the University of Nevada-Reno; and Julie Dickerson, of IowaStateUniversity.
“This grant is a $3 million grant to study the functional genomics of bud endodormancy in grapes. Dormancy is a critical stage of plant development in that it impacts the timing of winter survival – when does the plant shut down and when does it wake up, and how does that relate to the environment? That’s controlled by the genetics of the plant, as well as the interaction with the environment,” Fennell said.
Fennell explained that some grapes are temperature-sensitive, some are day length-sensitive, and some use both temperature and day length as signals for entering dormancy.
Initially Fennell will compare two very different species, one sensitive to day length and one not sensitive to day length. The experiment also will look at how the progeny from those lines, though genetically very closely related, respond to different environmental cues in regard to dormancy.
Having cultivars that enter dormancy before the environmental stress of severe cold is a critical issue for grape growers in northern regions such as South Dakota, Fennell said. Grape growers in more moderate climates sometimes have a different problem – temperatures may not be cold enough so that a plant truly enters dormancy, meaning grapes can be slower to begin actively growing and producing fruit once growing weather returns. That could cost growers valuable growing weather and market opportunities.
Kirby said the award means SDSU will be a lead institution studying abiotic stress in grapes, particularly the issues of how temperature and day length affect dormancy.
“We’re constantly working to integrate basic science, genomics and new frontiers into agricultural research. Anne has been working with grapes for many years and has developed valuable resources through very careful science,” Kirby said. “This is an exciting time for us, to see someone who has put in all the legwork and all the hard background work to now get recognized to do the real cutting-edge work.”
Dr. Gary Lemme, dean of SDSU’s College of Agriculture and Biological Sciences, said the award points to the importance of specialty crops as South Dakota agriculture presses into the 21st century. There are already at least seven active farm wineries in South Dakota, Lemme noted, which generate substantial revenue though only about 70 acres in the entire state of South Dakota are now devoted to growing grapes. Fennell’s groundbreaking research will not only benefit those northern growers, but grape growers around the world.
“This award by the National Science Foundation is a recognition of the quality science that is being conducted here at South DakotaStateUniversity,” Lemme said. “Dr. Fennell should be complimented for developing the team of scientists from other universities to work with her so that we’re doing fundamental science for an intended use of promoting the economic development of South Dakota.”