Dr. Neale will give a keynote address on Tuesday, August 26, for the IUFRO-CTIA Main Conference.  The abstract of his presentation is provided below.

Genomic Discovery for Application in Tree Breeding and Forest Health Management

 

Genomic discovery in forest trees follows paradigms from both agricultural crop and livestock improvement and human medicine.  Forest trees in a domesticated state can be improved using genomic-based breeding technologies whereas the health of trees in a natural and undomesticated state might be managed using those same technologies.  These applications begin by first dissecting complex traits in trees to their individual gene components and for that the association genetics approach is quite powerful in trees.  This is true for several reasons including large, random mating and unstructured populations and the rapid decay of linkage disequilibrium in many tree species.  Once marker by trait associations are discovered they can be used in genomic-based breeding and forest health diagnostics.   High-throughput DNA sequencing and genotyping technologies have enabled a new generation of research in forest genetics where combined quantitative and population genetic approaches can be used to better understand the relationship between naturally occurring genotypic and phenotypic diversity. 

 

Positions and Employment

• 1984-1986      Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Genetics, University of California, Davis


• 1986-1987      Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Forest Genetics, USDA Forest Service


• 1987-2005      Plant Molecular Geneticist, Institute of Forest Genetics, USDA Forest Service


• 1998-2001      Director, Institute of Forest Genetics, USDA Forest Service


• 1994-2005      Adjunct Faculty, Department of Environmental Horticulture, UCDavis


• 2005-present   Professor, Department of Plant Sciences, UCDavis


• 2006-present   Chair, Genetics Graduate Group, UCDavis


• 2006-2008      Section Chair, Agricultural Plant Biology, Dept. Plant Sciences, UCDavis


• 2008-present   Co-Chair, Bioenergy Research Group, UCDavis


• 2005-present   Editor in Chief, Tree Genetics and Genomes
  
  

Selected recent publications

• Krutovskii K.V., M. Troggio, G.R. Brown, K.D. Jermstad, D.B. Neale. (2004) Comparative Mapping in the Pinaceae. Genetics 168:447-461.


• Neale, D.B. and O. Savolainen. (2004) Association genetics of complex traits in conifers. Trends in Plant Science. 9:325-330.


• Peter, G. and D. Neale. (2004) Molecular basis for the evolution of xylem lignification. Curr. Op. Plant Biol. 7:1-6.


• Brown, G.R., G.P. Gill, R.J. Kuntz, C.H. Langley and D.B. Neale. (2004) Nucleotide diversity and linkage disequilibrium in loblolly pine. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 101:15255-15260.


• Krutovsky,K.V. and D. B. Neale. (2005) Nucleotide diversity and linkage disequilibrium in cold-hardiness and wood quality related candidate genes in Douglas-fir.  Genetics 171:2029-2041.


• Gonzalez-Martinez, S.C., E.Ersoz, G.R. Brown, N.C. Wheeler and D.B. Neale. (2006) Candidate genes for drought-stress response in Pinus taeda L. DNA sequence variation and natural selection.  Genetics 172:1915-1926.


• Gonzalez-Martinez, S. C., K. V. Krutovsky and D. B. Neale. (2006) Forest tree population genomics and adaptive evolution. New Phytologist 170:227-238.


• Neale, D.B. (2007) Genomics to tree breeding and forest health. Curr. Op. Genet. Develop. 17:539-544.


• White, T.L., W.T. Adams and D.B. Neale. (2007) Forest Genetics. CAB International. 682p.


• Neale, D.B. and P.K. Ingvarsson. (2008) Population, quantitative and comparative genomics of adaptation in forest trees. Curr. Op. Plant Biol. In press