P I G G E N O M E U P D A T E __________________________________________________________________ A Bimonthly Newsletter of the U.S. Pig Genome Coordination Program ************** No. 64 ************** * * * * * January 1, 2004 * ************************************** =========================================================================== 1. ISU-UI-USDA-NSIF jointly held swine QTL workshop and annual meeting 2. See you in San Diego for Plant and Animal Genome (PAG) XII 3. Pig arrays can be ordered now 4. Deadlines for 2004 NRI RFA were announced 5. Help us save money - email copy of Pig Genome Update available 6. Upcoming meetings 7. A special Thank You for your help and support =========================================================================== Happy Holidays and New Year to you, your families and colleagues!! o o o o o o o o o o o Swine QTL discovery and implementation were the topics at the jointly held ISU - UI - USDA and National Swine Improvement Federation (NSIF) sponsored workshop and annual meeting that met December 5-6 in Des Moines, Iowa. Despite the snow, the meeting was well attended by over 110 producers, swine industry personnel, researchers and students. A unique part of the program was a one-day workshop planned with funding from an USDA IFAS grant to Iowa State University and the University of Illinois. The workshop featured talks on QTL and candidate gene discovery and their use in marker assisted selection. Several QTL results from experiments at ISU, UI, UN, MSU, USDA and other locations were also presented. On day two, which was the NSIF meeting, several companies and industry groups including the Canadian Center for Swine Improvement, Gentec N.V., Babcock Genetics, Monsanto Choice Genetics, Sygen/PIC and NSR presented their marker discovery and implementation programs related to a number of traits. Additional talks discussed were biosecurity, selection for IMF and selection for disease resistance. The large attendance and the superb program made the meeting a real success. A special thanks goes out to the NSIF secretary Dr. Ken Stalder, ISU, and program chair, Dr. Jack Dekkers, ISU for all their efforts. Program papers can be found in the near future at http://www.nsif.com. o o o o o o o o o o o See you in San Diego!!! The Plant and Animal Genome XII will again be at the Town & Country Convention Center in San Diego, CA, from Saturday, January 10 through Wednesday, January 14, 2004. In addition to the outstanding plenary speakers that are scheduled, an excellent joint 2004 PAG Swine Workshop and NC1004 meeting is being planned by chair Dr. Diane Moody. This workshop will be held on Saturday and Sunday morning, January 10-11. Invited speakers will be describing a contig sequence from porcine chromosome 6 (Tosso Leeb), recombineering as a tool for harvesting genomic information (Larry Schook), and the implementation of marker assisted selection in commercial swine populations (Archie Clutter). Invited talks will be followed by coordinator, administrator, and station reports. A Sunday morning session will be devoted to a discussion of priorities, needs, and activities of the swine research community. A preliminary schedule and additional information for the meeting are found at: http://www.intl-pag.org/12/12-swine.html. Also of interest is the NAGRP business meeting which will be on Monday evening. A very limited amount of support might be available for NRSP-8 members and student participation. Please email the Coordinator at mfrothsc@iastate.edu. o o o o o o o o o o o Pig arrays can be ordered now!! Materials needed to produce a 13,000 element oligo array have been produced. Pig Genome Coordinator funds were used to buy the oligos and will be used to partially fund printing of these oligos on to glass slides. Initial printing of about 400 slides for the community will take place. To insure that the arrays are not wasted, individual researchers can request 20 free arrays and later up to 50 additional ones but they will be responsible for the printing costs of the additional ones. Printing costs will be $20 dollars a slide and will be billed directly to the researcher from the University of Minnesota facility where they will be printed. Two steps are required to order the arrays. Please go to the following web site: http://www.genome.iastate.edu/resources/array_request.html to place an order. Please note, to get the information on the gene list you must sign the Qiagen non-disclosure agreement (NDA). This likely requires visiting with your purchasing and or intellectual property office on your campus. Shipping will occur after you specify by email when you want the arrays. o o o o o o o o o o o Deadlines for 2004 NRI RFA were announced. Please go to the NRI website (www.reeusda.gov/nri/) for details. Most importantly, deadline dates have been changed such that Animal Protection (includes former animal health programs) and Animal Reproduction deadlines are Jan. 9, 2004 and those for Animal Genomics, Animal Genome Reagent & Tool Development and Functional Genomics of Agriculturally Important Organisms are June 15, 2004. Total 2004 NRI funding remains uncertain, but was set at $165M in the conference report of the Consolidated Appropriations Bill passed by the U.S. House and scheduled to be taken up by the Senate in January. New, multi-institutional special programs have been added to the '04 RFA, but it is unclear how much these will detract from typical individual investigator-based awards. Funding limits have also increased, most often to a total of $500,000 (varies depending on program). The indirect cost limit remains at 19% of total grant funds but may increase to 20% after the Bill passes (details supplied by J. Dodgson). o o o o o o o o o o o Help us save money!! If you would prefer to just receive an email copy of Pig Genome Update please email Max Rothschild at mfrothsc@iastate.edu or Ann Shuey at ashuey@iastate.edu and we will remove you from the printed mailing list. You can receive your newsletter by following these easy directions. To subscribe to Angenmap, send an email to angenmap-request@db.genome.iastate.edu and put in the Subject line the key word "subscribe" and you will be one of nearly 1,000 users of this list serve. o o o o o o o o o o o Upcoming meetings (see: http://www.genome.iastate.edu/community/meetings.html) Plant, Animal and Microbial Genome XII, joint with the NAGRP annual meetings, Jan. 10-14, 2004, Town & Country Convention Center, San Diego, CA. Please see www.intl-pag.org/ for information. Midwestern American Society of Animal Science Annual Meeting, March 15-17, 2001 at the Polk County Convention Center, Des Moines, Iowa. For information please contact http://www.asas.org/midwest/2004/index.html British Society of Animal Science Annual Meeting, April 5-7, 2004, York University. See www.bsas.org.uk/meetings/annual.htm. British Pig Breeders Roundtable, April 21-23, 2004, Wye UK. For details please contact Chris Haley at chris.haley@bbsrc.ac.uk American Society of Animal Science- American dairy Science -Poultry Science Association joint Meeting, July 25-29, 2004, St. Louis, MO. For details see http://www.fass.org/2004/. ISAG 2004, 29th International Conference on Animal Genetics, Sept. 11-16, 2004, Surugadai Campus, Meiji University, Tokyo, Japan. For more information see http://www2.kobe-u.ac.jp/~isag2004/ Additional items can be found at: http://www.agbiotechnet.com/calendar/index.asp. o o o o o o o o o o o A special thank you to each of you for your help and support of my role as coordinator. The success of this effort depends on all of us and this year I have been blessed with excellent support from many of you. In particular I want to thank Dr. Zhiliang Hu for his continued outstanding help in database activities and Ms. Kim Glenn and Ms. Ann Shuey of the ISU team who helped send out primers and process the newsletter. Finally, a special "thank-you" to all who offered constructive suggestions and help in getting the job done. I wish all of you a happy holiday season and healthy and productive New Year. <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> Contributions to Pig Genome Update 65 including short meeting announcements are always welcome. Please send by February 15, 2004. Max Rothschild U.S. Pig Genome Coordinator 2255 Kildee Hall, Department of Animal Science Iowa State University Ames, Iowa 50011 Phone: 515-294-6202, Fax: 515-294-2401 mfrothsc@iastate.edu cc: Muquarrab Qureshi, CSREES and Caird Rexroad II, ARS ============================================================================ U.S. PIG GENOME COORDINATION PROJECT +-----------------------------------+ | Paid for by funds from the NRSP-8 | Web: http://www.genome.iastate.edu | USDA/CSREES sponsored Pig Genome | Mailing list: | Coordination Program | angenmap@db.genome.iastate.edu +-----------------------------------+ ============================================================================