Root2Res: Root phenotyping and genetic improvement for rotational crops resilient to environmental change

Project Coordinator: Jean-Pierre Cohan - Arvalis

Deputy Project Coordinator: Timothy George - The James Hutton Institute

https://root2res.eu/

The project

The ambition of Root2Res is to develop crop systems ready for environmental change. Funded through the Horizon Europe programme, the study of root-based cultivars began in September 2022 gathering 22 partners from Europe and Africa, coordinated by Arvalis and the James Hutton Institute. It is anticipated that stakeholders including farmers and breeders will play a significant role in helping address the importance of root traits in resilience to stress and perfecting the necessary tools to be able to meaningfully measure them.

Root2Res, short for ‘Root phenotyping and genetic improvement for rotational crops resilient to environmental change’, will work until August 2027 on various current and potential rotational crops: cereals (barley, wheat), potato, legumes (faba bean, pea, lentils) and sweet potato. During that time, the multidisciplinary team will design and test innovative ideotypes that have the aim of enhancing tolerance to abiotic stress, while also improving resource efficiency and carbon sequestration in soils.

The field networks

We will establish several hubs for a range of activities, from consultation to trials and toolbox demonstration, fostering collaboration with stakeholders including breeders and farmers. These hubs will encompass a range of field conditions, creating a network of hubs with a range of agroclimatic conditions, considering different prevailing precipitation, temperature, and nutrient availability conditions, allowing us to compare and contrast impacts of abiotic stress on belowground and aboveground traits with environmental variation.

We will establish hubs in the UK (oceanic climate), Slovenia (humid continental climate), Morocco (Mediterranean climate) and France, which serves as a transitional point. Root2Res will facilitate stakeholder groups at each and work in collaboration with these groups to demonstrate and develop tools and approaches to improve crop resilience to abiotic stress.

Root2Res is part of the Horizon Europe research programme. Its work is supported by Innovate UK through the Horizon Europe Guarantee scheme Grant Agreement no. 101060124 and by the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) grant no. 23.00050.

Your participation is voluntary, and you have the right to withdraw your involvement and personal data at any time without any consequences. You have the right to refuse to answer particular questions and invitations.

Data Protection and Management

Arvalis is responsible for the processing of your personal data.

By accepting these terms, you allow the use of the information for the purposes of the Root2Res project:

1. Your personal data is intended for internal use of Root2Res and will not be shared by any means unless stated in this form.

2. The information gathered from activities organised by the Root2Res consortium will be treated confidentially, in order to report our research progress.

3. Image and voice recordings from activities can be used for related communication purposes in the absence of an alternative.

We will keep your personal data until we accomplish the objectives explained above. When it is no longer necessary, or you ask for it to be removed, it will be destroyed. You may at any time exercise your rights of revocation of consent, access, rectification, cancellation, limitation in the processing, opposition, and portability of data, as well as submit complaints to the authority within the consortium responsible for the processing of your personal data, by sending an e-mail to: root2res.data.officer@arvalis.fr

We will treat your information respectfully and in accordance with the provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of 27 April 2016 (GDPR).

Main contact for the activity

Charlotte White

ADAS

Charlotte.White@adas.co.uk