The NDSU corn-breeding program has released 10 new corn male and female inbred lines. These will be used for hybrid seed production and breeding programs developing short-season corn hybrids. Marcelo J. Carena, professor of plant sciences, leads the program.
The released lines were screened in summer- and winter-controlled stress nurseries and also tested in hybrid combinations across more than 50 environments in cooperation with industry. Experiments included top hybrid checks recommended by industry in target environments including western and northern North Dakota.
The 10 new lines add to the 64 NDSU elite and diverse corn products developed by the NDSU corn-breeding program and released in the last five years. During 2012-13, a total of 15 new corn inbred lines and 10 new corn populations were developed by the corn-breeding program and released by NDSU. Many of these came from genetic diversity program germplasm from the southern U.S., Mexico, Cuba, St. Croix, Brazil, Chile and Argentina, which were successfully adapted to the northern U.S. They have provided a combination of traits not available in industry hybrids.
The 2014 product development effort is a consequence of joint support from the Minnesota and North Dakota Corn Growers Associations as well as a large network of public and private cooperators assisting the NDSU corn-breeding program. The program conducts all trait evaluations and breeder seed increases and purification.
NDSU is recognized as one of the nation's top 108 public and private universities by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education.
