Boosting innovative breeding at IFVCNS – CROPINNO

Providing new solutions for accelerating climate-smart crops creation has become a number one task in breeding. A project funded by the European Commission under the agreement No. 101059784 “Stepping up scientific excellence and innovation capacity for climate-resilient crop improvement and production” CROPINNO is tackling with this problem. Within the framework of this project, Institute of Field and Vegetable Crops, National Institute of the Republic of Serbia (IFVCNS) is teaming up with reputable European research institutions and Universities for the introduction of new tools in IFVCNS breeding programs. On genetic level, we are exploiting state-of-the-art platforms for analysing sunflower epigenome, namely histone methylation and activities of non-coding RNAs to quest for important epiQTLs that would improve sunflowers quick response to abiotic stress. Moreover, we are introducing new phenotyping tools such as root phenotyping to identify root traits related to abiotic stress response. By combing latest molecular and phenotypic tools we will be able to accelerate creation of climate-resilient sunflower and be ready for what future environmental change brings us.