Breeding grapes and apples

When it comes to new apple and grape varieties, you could say Dr. Sean Myles’ work with genomics has born enough fruit to make him one of the country’s leading plant genetics researchers.

Using genomics, Myles can detect and track desired traits in seedlings, which can help those developing new cultivars be certain of some fruit attributes as soon as the seeds germinate – in other words, much more rapidly than the many years needed to grow a tree and wait for it to bear fruit.  The genomic-based process is also acknowledged to be cheaper and it could also be more efficient.

A Fredericton, N.B. native, Myles holds the Faculty Research Chair in Agriculture at Dalhousie University.

Through his Apple Diversity Group in Kentville, N.S., he has amassed a very diverse apple tree collection of more than 1,000 varieties from many parts of the world, in a collaboration between Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and Dalhousie University. While aiming to better understand genetic apple diversity, he also hopes to learn more about fruit biology and how to breed productive cultivars with less reliance on pesticides.