Plant & Animal Genomes XIII Conference Plant & Animal Genomes XIII ConferenceJanuary 15-19, 2005
Town & Country Convention Center
San Diego, CA
Since its inception in 2000, ICGI has been striving to promote cotton genomics research. The cotton genome is unique and complex and has two diploid subgenomes in a single nucleus. In spite of its complexity, cotton genomic information has surged in GenBank. G. hirsutum sequences alone have increased from 19022 to 29402 in a period of five months (July-December 2004). While the advance in research is evident, the information is scattered, each laboratory hosting their respective proprietary data. The need for a holistic approach to sequence the cotton genome and a centralized cotton database was stressed at the recently concluded 2004 ICGI workshop in India. Public-Private Partnerships have had success stories in genome projects with Celera Inc. playing a pivotal role in HGP, Syngenta and Monsanto in IRGSP, Pioneer in Maize Genome Project and 17 private companies in AGI. The importance of partnerships and alliances in genome projects will be stressed. The expectations of private industry, sustainable benefits and comparative advantages of the partnership will be underlined. While other plant genome projects are striding ahead, ICGI is yet to work out an agenda for collaborative research. A broad scheme of starting points, suggestions, and priorities for ICGI will be provided. Lessons from the Bermuda Agreement, IRGSP, AGI and other genome projects will be reviewed.