Responsible: Noor Bas

Overview of the collection

• accessions per taxon (May 2009)

The collection

The crucifer collection exists of more than 40 crop groups. The collection originates from the former Foundation for Plant Breeding (SVP), the Institute for Horticultural Plant Breeding (IVT) and from departments of the Wageningen Agricultural University (WAU, now part of Wageningen University and Research Centre). Part of the material was collected in the Netherlands in the framework of the EU project "The collection of landraces of Cruciferous crops in the EC countries" (Meer et al. 1984).
Presently, the CGN collection of cruciferous crops includes 1750 accessions. The collection contains mainly cultivars (1080), furthermore landraces (294) and research material (181). Only 14 accessions are documented as wild populations and of 181 accession the population type is not known. B. oleracea is represented with the highest number of accessions followed by B. rapa, Raphanus sativus, B. napus and B. carinata.
CGN developed the European Brassica Database (Bras-EDB) in the framework of the Brassica Working Group of the European Cooperative Programme for Crop Genetic Resources Networks (ECP/GR, Maggioni et al. 1997). The ECP/GR Brassica database contains passport data of most of the European Brassica collections (Hintum & Boukema 1993 and Boukema & Hintum 1998). The database, updated in November 2005, contains 19678 accessions from 35 collections from 24 countries.
CGN coordinated an European project on Brassica: "Brassica Collections for Broadening Agricultural Use" including "Characterising and utilising genetic variation in Brassica carinata for its exploitation as an oilseed crop" (RESGEN CT 99 109-112). This project deals with characterisation, evaluation, regeneration and documentation of B. napus, B. oleracea, B. rapa and B. carinata. Results of this project are downloadable via the BrasEDB website.


The Brassica oleracea collection

CGN gives high priority to the B. oleracea collection and aims to create a representative sample of the total genetic diversity in this crop in cooperation with other European genebanks in the Brassica network of the ECP/GR.
With the help of the Bras-EDB a core collection of B. oleracea was developed (Boukema et al. 1997) for an EU project entitled "The location and exploitation of genes for pest and disease resistance in European genebank collections of horticultural brassicas" (Leckie et al. 1996). A more balanced core, including more European Brassica collections, is develloped for the EU-project RESGEN CT 99 109-112.
Much attention was given to rationalize the B. oleracea collection by bulking duplicates into groups. The bulked accessions concerned selections of the same 'umbrella' varieties which were regarded as duplicates on the basis of their historical background and morphological resemblance in the field. Crop specialists advised in this activity. This effort resulted in a considerable reduction of the collection. A genetical analysis on the basis of electrophoresis of isoenzymes of part of the rationalized material justified the procedure (Hintum et al., 1996). Much attention was given to complete the collection with missing prominent open pollinated varieties. Hybrids are not included in the collection. 
The wild species are only represented with very low numbers. The B. oleracea collection gives a good representation of the old Dutch open pollinated varieties and Danish material is also well represented. Egyptian landraces are included in the cauliflower and white cabbage collections. The white cabbages include also material from the former Soviet Union. The Chinese kale's originate mostly from Thailand and Taiwan. In the B. oleracea collection cauliflower is represented with the highest numbers. In this crop almost no rationalization took place because the accessions are morphological rather distinct.


Other crucifers

The B. rapa collection is a very diverse collection including vegetable, fodder and oilseed crops. Although most material involves varieties from Europe, part of the vegetables originates form Asia. The B. napus collection represents besides oilseed also fodders and includes mainly varieties from Europe. The B. carinata and B. nigra collections represent mainly Ethiopean landraces and the B. juncea collection includes both oilseed and vegetable crops. The Raphanus collection includes mainly radish cultivars from Europe and giant radish from Asia. The fodder radish originates mainly from the former Soviet Union, the Netherlands and Germany. The Sinapis alba collection is predominantly of European origin.


Regeneration

For regeneration 60-120 plants are used. All crucifers are regenerated in isolated plots or in cages in glasshouse compartments. Most of the B. oleracea crops are biennial and need vernalisation. In general the B. oleracea material is planted in the field. The vegetative mature plants are potted in autumn and placed for overwintering in a glasshouse at 5-10°C. This gives the possibility to do some negative selection against off-types. Before overwintering the cabbages are decapitated. From early cabbages cuttings are made from shoots after decapitation in the field and the resulting plants overwinter. As soon as flowers appear, the plants are transferred to cages and pollinated by blowflies (Dotinga et al. 1988) or bumble bees. Dutch breeding companies assisted in the regeneration work.
The field crops of the crucifer collection are regenerated in spatially isolated fields in winter rye or Triticale.


Characterization and evaluation

Parts of the collection have been characterized and evaluated for more than 70 traits. Most of the B. oleracea material has been characterized for morphological traits, according to CGN descriptor lists, partly derived from UPOV and ECP/GR descriptor lists (IBPGR 1990). Evaluation data on characters such as disease resistance are obtained from users of the material. Parts of the collection were screened in the framework of two EU projects for resistances to different pests and diseases, glucosinolates and seedstorage components. More information, results and literature from these projects can be found at the BrasEDB website. Data on resistance in part of the B. oleracea collection to Fusarium oxysporum, Plasmodiophora brassicae and Thrips tabaci are also available. Part of the B. napus collection was screened for resistance to Heterodera schachtii and for cadmium uptake. Part of the B. nigra collection was screened for resistance to Phoma lingam. Of the B. carinata collection the fatty acid composition was determined by Mahler and Auld (1988). More details on the collection is given in Soest & Boukema (1995).


Literature

Boukema, I.W., Th.J.L. van Hintum & D. Astley, 1997. The creation and composition of the Brassica oleracea Core Collection. Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter 111: 29 -32.