Scott Lindell1, David Bailey1, Margaret Aydlett1, Michael Marty Rivera2, Yaoguang Li2, Schery Umanzor8, Crystal Ng2, Jean-Luc Jannink3,4, Kelly Robbins4, Mao Huang4, Jeremy Schmutz5, Kendall Barbery6, Michael Chambers7, Hauke Kite- Powell1, Loretta Roberson9, Michael Stekoll8, Charles Yarish2
1 Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, MS #34, Woods Hole, MA 02543 USA, 2University of Connecticut, 1 University Place, Stamford, CT 06901-2315 USA, 3USDA-ARS, NAA, Robert W. Holley Center, Tower Rd, Ithaca, NY 14853-2901, 4 Plant Breeding & Genetics, School of Integrative Plant Sciences, 310 Bradfield Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, 5HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, 601 Genome Way Northwest, Huntsville, AL 35806, 6 GreenWave, 315 Front Street, New Haven, CT 06513 USA, 7 University of New Hampshire, School of Marine Sci. and Ocean Eng., Durham, NH 03824, 8 University of Alaska Fairbanks, 17101 Point Lena Loop Rd, Juneau, AK 99801 USA, 9Marine Biological Laboratory, 7 MBL Street, Woods Hole, MA 02543 USA
Seaweed farming in the Gulf of Maine has expanded rapidly over the past decade. As part of ARPA-E’s MARINER program, we have conducted a selective breeding program to improve the productivity and composition of sugar kelp, which could serve new markets for food, animal feeds, bio-products, and eventually biofuels. We maintain about a thousand monoclonal gametophyte cultures that can be used as parents for generating crosses. Kelp crosses were planted in “common garden” farm arrays over four seasons (2018 through 2022) in New Hampshire, USA. A summary of trait measurements and analyses of yield, composition and morphology for 1,008 family plots and over 12,000 individual kelp blades will be presented. One highlight is that several plots exceeded 20 kg/m harvest wet weight with the top plot weighing 28 kg/m or 4 kg/m dry weight – about 4 times the commercial average. We have used pedigree, genotypic marker data, and harvest phenotypes to estimate breeding value of parents and predict offspring performance. Ultimately, we are meeting goals of improving yields of dry matter per unit area more than 20% per generation. We have sequenced the whole genome of ~500 parents, tested their crosses, and phenotyped harvests to begin building a publicly available database for cooperative breeding (sugarkelpbase.org). We have also completed an annotated reference genome for sugar kelp that enables the identification of natural mutations on targeted genes to potentially create non-reproductive sporophytes. Using sterile sporophytes open opportunities for more productive farms while protecting natural genetic diversity.