21-23 May 2012, Norwich UK
The UK’s Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and Government of India’s Department of Biotechnology (DBT), organised a joint UK-India workshop to scope potential areas of research collaboration in the area of crop genomics.
Facilitated by RCUK India and the UK Science and Innovation Network, this workshop was the final one in a series of three BBSRC-DBT collaborative interactions, the first two in bioenergy and livestock health.
Held between 21 and 23 May at The Genome Analysis Centre (TGAC) and the John Innes Centre (JIC) in Norwich, the workshop brought together senior members of the UK and Indian crop genomics, bioinformatics and sequencing research communities to explore possible areas of collaboration.
Brian Harris, and Debbie Harding from the BBSRC’s Agriculture, Food and Environment Sector presented an overview of BBSRC’s strategic priorities for biosciences and support for crop science research.
Dr Meenakshi Munshi, Director at DBT also provided an overview of DBT’s activities in India and the support it offers for agriculture research.
Representatives from each delegation provided an overview of the crop genomics research landscapes in both the UK and India across the following four themes:
- Wheat
- Brassica
- Solanaceae
- Sequencing/Genomics and Bioinformatics
(All presentations are available upon request from rcuk.india@rcuk.ac.uk).
Working in groups, the delegates discussed the UK and Indian strengths and research needs in these areas of crop genomics research; and identified priority research themes where, by working together, UK and Indian scientists would be able to achieve significantly more than they could do alone.
The two funding bodies, BBSRC and DBT, are currently in discussion about mechanisms to fund collaborative research in this area.
In order to provide the visiting Indian delegation a clearer understanding of the UK’s crop science research, BBSRC organised tours of the JIC, TGAC, University of Nottingham, Rothamsted Research and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
A report from the workshop is available here 
.