Agriculture
Plant breeding
Serious global challenges already apparent today are being exacerbated by the rise in the world population. The increasing demand for plant biomass – not only for food, but also for feed and energy – requires sweeping innovations in the field of plant production. To meet these challenges optimisation of crop yields and adaptation of plants to changing climatic conditions are crucial and call for intensive technological developments. Plant breeding is a key technology to ensure the commercially viable, consumer-oriented, sustainable and environmentally sound production of plants. The innovative power of breeding contributes to all parts of the agricultural value chain, from characterising and utilising genetic resources to providing sufficient amounts of high-quality products in the areas of food, feed, fuel and fibre.
Research at the Chair of Plant Breeding is the quantitative genetic analysis of important traits of our crops such as yield, resource efficiency or adaptation of plants. By consistently employing the latest developments in the field of DNA analysis such as "next-generation" sequencing technologies, bioinformatics, genetical statistics and efficient phenotyping, breeding research is making crucial contributions to characterizing native biodiversity, elucidating its functional characteristics and explaining genetic phenomena such as heterosis and genotype-by-environment interactions. The fundamental insights of quantitative genetics are of high practical relevance in that they contribute to developing optimized, genome-based breeding strategies, to the efficient development of varieties and thus to a sustainable increase in the efficiency of agricultural production.
At the TUM Chair of Plant Breeding, projects are currently being conducted on four crops (maize, rye, wheat, sunflower). Research topics include resistance against abiotic stress (cold tolerance in rye, drought tolerance in maize and wheat), biotic stress (European corn borer resistance in maize) and product quality (wheat). The main topic of all of these projects is the integration of genomic information into the very complex and laborious breeding techniques.
In order to keep up with the rapid pace of developments in the fields of molecular biology, bioinformatics and breeding research, the Synbreed AgroCluster was founded, with funding from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) totalling 12.8 million Euros. A unique interdisciplinary center for genome-based breeding research was thus created coordinated at the Chair of Plant Breeding of the Technische Universität München, Germany, with the goal of developing genome-based selection strategies. The Synbreed AgroCluster is highly innovative and unites scientific excellence with a high degree of practical relevance and application. In the context of a knowledge-based bio-economy, Synbreed will make a significant contribution to the competitiveness of German agriculture.
Bayerischer Verdienstorden
Max-Schönleutner Medaille
Heinz Maier Leibnitz Medal, Technische Universität München, Germany
Award from the "Humanismus heute" (Humanism Today) Foundation, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
Fellowship from the state education programme of Baden-Württemberg
English, French, German
Short CV/Education and training
Selected publications
Lehermeier C, Krämer N, Bauer E, Bauland C, Camisan C, Campo L, Flament P, Melchinger AE, Menz M, Meyer N, Moreau L, Moreno-Gonzáles J, Ouzunova M, Pausch H, Ranc N, Schipprack W, Schönleben M, Walter H, Charcosset A, Schön CC: “Usefulness of multiparental populations of maize (Zea mays L.) for genome-based prediction“. Genetics. 2014; 198: 3-16.
Bauer E, Falque M, Walter H, Bauland C, Camisan C, Campo L, Meyer N, Ranc N, Rincent R, Schipprack W, Altmann T, Flament P, Melchinger AE, Menz M, Moreno-González J, Ouzunova M, Revilla P, Charcosset A, Martin OC, Schön CC: “Intraspecific variation of recombination rate in maize". Genome Biology. 2013; 14: R103.
Wimmer V, Lehermeier C, Albrecht T, Auinger HJ, Wang Y, Schön CC: “Genome-wide prediction of traits with different genetic architecture through efficient variable selection“. Genetics. 2013; 195: 573-587.
Schön, CC, Dhillon BS, Utz HF, Melchinger AE: “High congruency of QTL positions for heterosis of grain yield in three crosses of maize”. Theor. Appl. Genet. 2010; 120: 321-332.
Schön CC, Utz HF, Groh S, Truberg B, Openshaw S, Melchinger AE: “Quantitative trait locus mapping based on resampling in a vast maize testcross experiment and its relevance to quantitative genetics for complex traits”. Genetics. 2004; 167: 485-498.
Selected projects
MAZE – Accessing the genomic and functional diversity of maize to improve quantitative traits
BayKlimaFit – Strategies for the adaptation of crop plants to climate change
FullThrottle – Maximizing photosynthetic efficiency in maize
Functional characterization of candidate genes significantly associated with carbon isotope discrimination in maize (SFB924)
InnoSun – Using new innovative breeding approaches in sunflower to increase oil yield, oleic acid content and disease resistance
Innovation cluster: synergistic plant and animal breeding (SYNBREED)
Membership in scientific bodies/juries
Member of the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
Member of German Research Foundation (DFG) senate
Member of the scientific advisory boards for the Max-Planck-Institut für Züchtungsforschung, the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Cultivated Plant Research (IPK) (2010 – 2017), the Julius Kühn Institute (JKI) (2009 – 2017), the excellence cluster "Amaizing", the INRA metaprogram SelGen, GENSAP – Center for genomic selection in animals and plants, the NSF Plant Genome Initiative "Biology of rare alleles in maize and its wild relatives" and the global Open-Source Breeding Informatics Initiative GOBII
Member of the editorial board of Theoretical and Applied Genetics and BMC Plant Biology
Peer reviewer for national and international funding programmes, e.g. German Research Foundation (DFG); German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF); German Federal Ministry of Nutrition, Agriculture and Consumer Protection; German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation; Leibniz Society, Alexander von Humboldt-foundation, European Research Council (ERC), National Science Foundation (NSF), L'Agence nationale de la Recherche (ANR), Wiener Wissenschafts-, Forschungs- und TEchnologiefonds (WWTF), Generation Challenge Programme)
Peer reviewer for scientific journals (e.g. Genetics, Theoretical and Applied Genetics, Plant Breeding, Euphytica)
Visiting lecturer at the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Zaragoza, Spain
Contact
You can only see the contact information of the academics in the database if you are a registered user of AcademiaNet.
Please register here
Please download the brochure "No more excuses" and read more about female experts in Europe, and about AcademiaNet.
Agriculture, Environment, Humanities, Social and behavioural sciences, Rural development, Environmental studies, Gender, Race and ethnicity studies, Feminist studies, Political ecology, Transdisciplinary science and participatory methodologies
Agriculture, Biological and related sciences, Wheat genetics; senescence and nutrient remobilisation; cereal grain nutritional value; genomics
Agriculture, Biological and related sciences, Sustainability Science with a focus on human-Environment interactions
Agriculture, Field Agricultural sciences: Area of specialization: food science
