Induced Genetic Variation, TILLING and NGS-Based Cloning

Mutagenesis is one of the most important tools available to barley geneticists and breeders in order to investigate trait inheritance and to provide useful genetic variation to breeding programmes. Recent advancements in genomics, including the increasing availability of barley genome sequence information, are making mutagenesis even more valuable. In a forward genetics perspective (from traits to genes), the main improvements are being obtained by the exploitation of high-throughput phenotyping and genotyping. SNP genotyping and next-generation sequencing (NGS) platforms enable to genetically and physically map, or even to clone, target mutant genes in single-step experiments, once segregating populations are available. In barley, reverse genetics (from genes to traits), both transposon-based mutagenised populations and multiple TILLING resources, are becoming available or increasing their coverage. These resources too can be made more effective if matched with NGS-based molecular screening.