EDMONTON – Alberta livestock and oilseed research got a $4.5 million boost with the launch of two agricultural research centres at the University of Alberta.
University of Alberta professor Dr. Randy Weselake said the research at Phytola, the new plant research centre, hopes to increase oil content of canola from 42 percent to 45 or 46 percent by keying in on a high-performance enzyme.
Increasing the oil content one percent could mean an extra $90 million to the crushing and extraction industry, he said.
Researchers are also hoping new varieties will be better suited to withstand drought stress and improve the oil for nutraceutical and industrial uses.
Steve Moore, head of the other new research centre, Livestock Gentec Centre, said he hopes to help beef producers better learn the benefits of genetic mapping.
He said although dairy cattle breeders and researchers have used genetic information to improve performance for years, the technology hasn’t been adopted for beef cattle producers to the same extent.
With dairy cattle, it used to take five to seven years before a dairy bull could be proven valuable, but using genetic information, it only takes a year to show if a dairy bull is valuable or not.
The same data needs to be delivered to the beef industry to help producers predict carcass data, or how an animal will perform, said Moore.
“This is pretty high tech stuff. It’s the same technology as used in human medicine.”
Moore said finding markers for disease would be a huge benefit to beef producers, but the records for disease in beef cattle are not as complete as they are for dairy cattle.
He said Gentec wants to use the technology to go after the “hard to measure stuff” like reproduction, carcass traits, meat quality and health quality.
John Kennelly, University agriculture dean said while the centres are funded for two years with money from Alberta Innovates Bio Solutions, a provincial research network, they hope to show value quickly to extend the research funding.
