Odds on for good science: Statistician wins major agricultural research award

In a branch of research dominated by crop breeders, agronomists, and other agricultural specialists, a statistician might give himself low odds to receive a prize. But José Crossa, head of CIMMYT’s Biometrics and Statistics Unit, recently won the 2008 Outstanding Scientist Award from the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) for developing methods to conserve and use seed collections of leading crops like maize and wheat.

As part of its mission, CIMMYT conserves some 180,000 unique collections of maize and wheat seed from over 100 countries. Even stored as it is under near-zero temperatures and low moisture, the seed eventually loses its power to germinate, so old collections must be regenerated. For this, viable seed from the collections is grown out to furnish a fresh stock. If not done properly, potentially valuable genes from the original collection can be lost. Beginning in the late 1980s, José Crossa, head of CIMMYT’s Biometrics and Statistics Unit, began work with world-class genetic resource and statistics experts to develop suitable regeneration methods for maize and wheat seed collections.

“Crossa's contribution is vital to conserving the plant genetic resources on which humanity may someday depend for survival,” says CIMMYT Director General Tom Lumpkin.

In December, the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) singled out Crossa from among some 1,000 researchers who work in CGIAR centers (of which CIMMYT is one) for its 2008 Outstanding Scientist Award. The accomplishments of Crossa and his associates are documented in 150 international peer-reviewed journal articles, over 20 book chapters, and more than 60 technical and conference papers.

Deciphering decades of data
For more than 30 years, CIMMYT has sent select sets of experimental maize and wheat varieties to partners in hundreds of countries who grow them, keep seed of promising varieties for use in their own breeding programs, and return performance data to the center. Crossa and his team have developed powerful ways of interpreting the data to understand better the relationships between individual varieties—and even gene segments associated with key crop traits—and their performance in specific farming environments.

Crossa has worked closely over the years with Suketoshi Taba (left), head of maize genetic resources at CIMMYT. "Crossa's work established the theoretical basis of determining the proper population size and crossing methods to minimize the loss of genes from original seed samples of crops like maize," says Taba.

In recent years, Crossa has also worked with molecular geneticists like CIMMYT's Susanne Dreisigacker on methods for mapping the wheat genome to find DNA markers for disease resistance or other valuable traits and to understand gene expression in crop plants. Finally, Crossa has helped provide training in biometrics—statistics applied to the biological sciences—for some 500 researchers from developing countries.

Crossa credits team members for much of his accomplishments. "Work of this complexity could not be done by one person alone," he says, mentioning associates Jorge Franco, of the University of the Republic of Uruguay; Mateo Vargas, of the University of Chapingo, Mexico; Juan Burgueño, Gregorio Alvarado, and Jesús Cerón, of the Colegio de Postgraduados, Mexico; and José Miguel Cortés, of the National University of Colombia.

A bridge to modern agriculture for Central Asia and the Caucasus
CIMMYT also shared the 2008 CGIAR King Baudouin Award for its part in a massive and intensive 10-year effort to rejuvenate food production in countries of Central Asia and the Caucasus (CAC), an area that includes southwest Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. Experts from nine CGIAR centers worldwide implemented dozens of new agricultural and environmental technologies that are boosting food production and incomes in the CAC region.

“Nearly 40 million rural people in the countries of Central Asia and the Caucasus were essentially stranded by the break-up of the Soviet Union, which left their economies shrinking and poverty increasing, with food security a major concern,” said Christopher Martius, head of the CAC Program’s Facilitation Unit. The King Baudouin Award is given by the CGIAR every two years in recognition of an outstanding contribution to agriculture in developing countries.

See also the December 2008 edition of the electronic newsletter of the CGIAR.

For more information: José Crossa, head, Biometrics and Statistics Unit, CIMMYT (j.crossa@cgiar.org)