From August 21-26, 2022, the first Plant Phenomics Summer School was held at the training and production base of ASU "Mountain Legend", Kamennomostsky settlement, Republic of Adygea. Twenty students, including an employee of SFSCA RAS, were introduced to modern methods and approaches to phenotyping.
The summer school on plant phenomics is held within the project of the Adygeya State University program "Priority 2030" and the federal program "Bread of Russia", implemented by the N.I. Vavilov All-Russian Institute of Plant Genetic Resources (VIR) within the framework of the Federal Scientific and Technological Program for the Development of Genetics and Genetic Technologies.
The teaching staff of the school included specialists from Adygeya State University, the N.I. Vavilov All-Russian Institute of Plant Genetic Resources, and the Institute of Plant Cytology and Genetics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), the Siberian Federal Scientific Center of Agro-BioTechnologies RAS, the Nizhny Novgorod State University, and the All-Russian Research Institute of Plant Protection. Under their guidance, students were introduced to the theoretical foundations of phenotyping, organic farming, biological plant protection, and learned how to independently apply modern tools of phenotypic analysis.
The Plant Phenomics Summer School is a joint project of ASU and VIR aimed at developing interdisciplinary research in plant genetic resources, molecular biology, bioinformatics and transfer of results to the educational process at the university.
Phenomics is a young functional area of plant physiology and genetics devoted to the study of the phenome, which represents the set of phenotypic traits of an organism, in the form of norms of responses of these systems - providing the development of genomic research and revealing the relationship of genes with specific traits. It helps researchers translate large amounts of information from modern transmiters and sensors into new knowledge through computer data processing and modeling, shortening the distance from basic science to the practical application of results in crop production and breeding.
"Modern phenomics also requires modern tools for automatic and highly productive data fixation and analysis, which is impossible without the introduction of machine vision and the development of analytical software. These are exactly the issues the Summer School is focusing on. Application of modern methods of work will help biologists to get measurements on much more plants, and what is especially important, they will be objective - unlike manual work, when subjective factor of work of different people can make errors in measurements", - commented Alexey Zavarzin, VIR Deputy Director.