Research breakthrough in quest for better barley
Scottish scientists could be on the verge of realising the long-sought goal of combining the yield potential of six row barleys with the uniformity and quality of two row varieties.
Work carried out by researchers at the University of Dundee and the James Hutton Institute has indicated that new barley lines created by bringing together these traits would dramatically benefit the brewing and distilling industries by offering improved grain quality.
Malt industries in the UK currently prefer two row barleys due to grain uniformity and weight over the more variable grains from six row varieties which also produce less consistent results in the malting and distilling processes.
The Impromalt project, funded by the Agricultural and Horticultural Development Board, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the Scottish Government, has identified the key genetic traits that give spring barley its malting quality and has used DNA finger-printing to back-cross these traits into two and six-row winter barley cultivars, in an attempt to bridge the quality gap between the two crops.
“For the farming community, this means an extension of market opportunities and the spreading of harvest load with an earlier maturing crop,” said the Hutton’s Dr Bill Thomas.
“Under predicted climate change scenarios, the ‘drought escape’ mechanism provided by the early maturity of winter barley means that the crop is less susceptible to large fluctuations in grain protein content which drier summers will bring about so that farmers will be more likely to secure a plannedfor malting premium.”
The work, claimed Thomas, would help secure the £2.5 billion contributed to the exchequer by the distilling sector and over £3bn from brewing – with both industries employing 650,000 people directly and indirectly.
A spokesman for the Hutton – which recently received £62 million to develop the International Barley Hub and Advanced Plant Growth Centre – said that while it typically takes about 15 years to develop a new barley variety it was hoped this could be reduced to around 7 years through ‘speed breeding techniques which would soon be readily available.
And research published this week showed that combining specific pairs of ‘row-type’ genes generated barley with improved grain uniformity:
“It also increased the number of heads per plant, while other combinations increase grain weight even compared to two row barley, ticking many of the boxes barley growers may want,” said researcher, Dr Sarah Mckim.
“The next step is to see how these combinations perform in an elite breeding environment and how well they flourish in the field.”