Glossary of Terminology & Acronyms

Term / Acronym	Definition
ABC	African Bean Consortium East African common bean breeding programme for five pathogen constraints my MAS.
Alectra	Parasitic Weed (common name 'alectra') The genus Alectra (family Scrophulariaceae) includes a large number of tropical parasitic or hemi-parasitic plants.
ALS	Angular Leaf Spot A disease of plants, characterised by angular, watery spots on the leaves and fruit, caused by any of several bacteria.
ANT	Anthracnose A fungal disease of plants, characterised by sunken spots or lesions (blight) of various colours in leaves, stems, fruits, or flowers resulting in wilting, withering, and death of tissues.
Agronomy	The science of soil management and crop production.
APS / TEMED	Ammonium persulphate/N,N,N',N'-tetramethylethylenediamine Used to polymerise polyacrylamide gels for electrophoresis.
Backcross Breeding	A breeding method used to move one or a few desirable genes from an agronomically poor line to an elite line. This is done by crossing the line having a small number of desirable genes (donor parent line) to an elite line (recurrent parent), and crossing offspring with the desired gene(s) to the recurrent parent.
BCMNV	Bean Common Mosaic Necrosis Virus BCMNV is transmitted by aphids and through infected seeds. Infected plants, have distorted leaves (curling, strapping, or puckering of tissues along leaf veins) and mosaic symptoms (alternating areas of light and dark green). Plants may be stunted and have only a few pods. Necrosis produces dark streaks on petioles and stems.
BLAST	Basic Local Alignment Search Tool A bioinformatic search tool used to compare biological sequences, including nucleotide and amino acid sequences.
Breeder Seed	Also known as prebasic seed. It is directly controlled by the originating plant breeder, sponsoring institution or firm which supplies the initial source and recurring increases of foundation seed. There are no certification standards for breeder seed.
CBB	Common Bacterial Blight A blight disease which causes sudden severe yellowing and withering of plants. It is caused by several different species of common bacteria.
Cercospora canescens	A fungus that causes a leaf spot disease in cowpea.
Certified Seed	Produced from foundation, registered, certified, or other approved seed stocks. This seed should be no more than two generations from foundation seed. Certified seed cannot be used to produce certified seed after two generations without the approval of the state certification agency, which can approve production only under exceptional conditions.
Co-dominant	A situation in which two different alleles for a genetic trait are both expressed.
Colletotrichum truncatum	A fungus that causes brown blotch disease in cowpea.
Dissemination	The act of distributing or spreading widely.
Dolichos	Orphan legume crop species such as Lablab purpureus.
Donor Parent	The parent with favourable genetic material to be transferred to an elite parent. Used to pass genetic traits on through reproduction.
dNTP	Deoxyribonucleotide triphosphate A generic term referring to the four deoxyribonucleotides: dATP, dCTP, dGTP and dTTP.
Electrophoresis	The separation of charged molecules (Proteins, DNA or RNA) in an electric field through a gel or other medium.
Foundation Seed	Produced from breeder's seed or foundation seed under the control of the originator or sponsoring institution or licence. Foundation seed is controlled by the originating plant owner or licence.
Fusarium wilt	A soil-borne fungal pathogen which causes vascular wilt disease in cowpea.
Genotype	The genetic makup of an organism or group of organisms with reference to a single trait, set of traits, or an entire complex of traits.
Germplasm	A collection of individual plants that contains a species' genetic variation. It can be represented and propagated by any living propagule such as seeds, cuttings, or even cells. Germplasm is the basis of plant breeding programmes. It is usually limited to any sexually compatible species for a given crop.
Heterozygous	When an individual has different alleles at a given gene or marker locus, such as Aa instead of AA or aa.
Homozygous	When an individual has two copies of the same allele at a given gene or marker locus, such as AA or aa rather than Aa.
hPAGE	Horizontal Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis A bespoke electrophoresis system developed by Professor Southern and provided to all labs supported by the Kirkhouse Trust.
KBioscience	A service provider that has developed its own range of SNP genotyping chemistry and instrumentation. Now called LGC Genomics.
MAS	Marker Assisted Selection The use of DNA markers to improve response to selection. The markers will be closely linked to one or more target loci.
MLPA	Multiple Ligation-Dependent Probe Amplification A multiplex PCR based method using probes to distinguish between sequences which differ in only one nucleotide.
MoU	Memorandum of Understanding
NGO	Non-Governmental Organisations are legally constituted corporations created by natural or legal people that operate independently from any form of government. The term originated from the United Nations, and normally refers to organisations that are not a part of a government and are not conventional for-profit businesses.
Orphan Legumes	Legumes which have been overlooked in terms of genetic advancement by other funders. The Trust considers cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L.), Dolichos (Lablab purpureus), horsegram (Macrotyloma uniflorum (Lam.) Verdc.) and moth bean (Phaseolus acontifolia Jacq) to be orphan legumes.
PCR	Polymerase Chain Reaction A technique for rapidly producing many copies of a fragment of DNA for diagnostic or research purposes.
PhaseolusGenes	http://phaseolusgenes.bioinformatics.ucdavis.edu Bean Breeders' Molecular Marker Toolbox developed by the UC Davis. Designed to be used as a searchable marker database, a genome browser and a tool for comparative mapping for Phaseolus vulgaris and other leguminous species.
Phenotype	The observable physical or biochemical characteristics of an organism that are determined by a combination of the genetic composition (genotype) and the environment of the individual (P = G x E).
PI	Principal Investigator is the lead scientist for a particular science (or other research project).
Polymorphism	A change in shape or form from one variation to another. E.g. the sequence in DNA can exist in many different forms.
QTL	Quantitative Trait Locus Stretches of DNA containing or linked to the genes that underlie a quantitative trait.
Registered Seed	Produced from foundation or other approved seed stocks. This class of seed shall be of a quality suitable for the production of certified seed, as approved by the certifying agency. This seed is usually, but not always, one generation from foundation seed.
RILs	Recombinant Inbred Line population A recombinant inbred line (RIL) population is developed through single seed descent from the F2 generation. The result is a set of homogeneous, homozygous lines for which large amounts of seed can be produced for replicated trials. This type of population is often useful for mapping QTLs.
RR	Root Rot A disease of plants mainly induced by parasitic Pythium species and characterised by impeded root function resulting in wilting and death of plant.
Seed Certification	Various different processes exist across the world for seed certification. In England and Wales Seed Certification is a quality assurance process which ensures that seeds are sufficiently pure, healthy, viable and correctly labelled. Seed marketing is regulated and, for most agricultural and vegetable species, only seeds which have been certified may be sold.
Seed Classes	There are four classes (generations) of certified seed. In order of genetic purity they are breeder, foundation, registered and certified seed. Please see separate entries for definitions on these classes.
Sericulture	Another term for silk farming.
SNP	Single Nucleotide Polymorphism Genetic variation in a DNA sequence that occurs when a single nucleotide in a genome is altered.
SSD	Single-seed Descent Deriving a population of inbred plants by self-pollinating individuals for several generations. A method of genetic selection where a single seed from each parent plant is at random selected to grow the resulting generations from until a genetically stable plant has been produced.
SSR	Simple Sequence Repeat A section of DNA consisting of very short nucleotide sequences repeated many times, the number of repeats varying between members of the species.
Striga	Parasitic weed (common name 'witchweed'). The genus Striga (family Scrophulariaceae) includes a large number of tropical parasitic or hemi-parasitic plants.
Taq polymerase	An enzyme originally isolated from a bacterium, which is used to synthesise DNA at high temperature.
TEMED	See APS / TEMED
Thrips	Cowpea flower thrips, Megalurothrips Sjostedti, feeds on the bud, which results in browning, distortion and abscission of floral parts.
Under Utilised Crops	Used interchangeably with Orphan Legumes.
WACC	West African Cowpea Consortium Kirkhouse Trust breeding programme for resistance to Striga and other contraints by MAS.

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Glossary of Terminology & Acronyms