Scientists from Crop and Food Lincoln are cooperating with research organisations in Christchurch’s Friendship city of Wuhan, China, to develop potatoes with superior qualities including resistance to cold-induced sweetening.
Professor Tony Conner, a senior scientist at Crop and Food, Lincoln, was in China this week to meet the Wuhan scientists he is working with on the international potato genome sequencing project and to speak at the China-New Zealand Science to Market conference in Beijing.
New Zealand and China are part of the International Potato Genome Sequencing Consortium. China is mapping the gene sequence of two of the 12 chromosomes and Crop and Food is mapping one. The other countries involved include Netherlands, Britain, Ireland, Australia, Denmark, Turkey and Poland.
The scientists are working at breeding potato cultivars with disease resistance and also desirable processing traits. Professor Conner said that when potatoes are stored at a low temperature after harvest their starch breaks down to sugar, which results in them browning when cooked
