Welcome To The Kirkhouse Trust
About Us:
The Kirkhouse Trust was set up in September 2000. It is a small Scottish charity (No. SC 030508), funded by gift aid donations from Oxford Gene Technology IP Ltd, a UK company founded by Professor Sir Ed Southern. The Trust has identified "agricultural crop improvement research for the developing world" as its current funding focus.The Trust's main activities centre on grain legumes. The Trust is working with plant breeders in eight countries of West Africa to improve cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) and in five countries of East Africa to improve the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) by marker assisted breeding. Within these programmes, the Trust provides support through scholarships, fellowships, for training trips and for attendance at international conferences. The Trust donates equipment and consumables to the participating institutions. The Trust continues to supports some legume research projects in India, particularly at the University of Agricultural Sciences, in Bangalore.
An overarching objective is to strengthen and promote research skills in the developing world. The Trust is interested in schemes which link research projects with the training of scientists e.g. in modern molecular methods of crop improvement, such as marker assisted selection. In this context, the Trust has funded legume sequencing projects to aid in marker discovery. For example, a 1x 'gene space' sequence of an African cultivar of cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) was carried out by Orion Genomics Inc. and this data is held and exploited by the University of Virginia. A similar project is nearing completion for the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris), led by University of California at Davis (involving Orion Genomics Inc., Washington University Genome Sequencing Centre and the University of Virginia).
The Trust funds smaller projects outside its main programmes, but there must be exceptional reasons to support crops other than grain legumes. In addition, the Trust provides small grants for travel to conferences and for short study visits. Please click here for more information and for guidance on how to apply.