'Plant Breeding: Sustaining the Future' Abstracts of the XVIth EUCARPIA Congress, Edinburgh, Scotland, 10-14 September 2001 INTROGRESSION MAPPING - THE ROUTE TO DESIGNER BREEDING H.M. THOMAS, M.W. HUMPHREYS, W.G. MORGAN, J.A. HERPER, I.P. ARMSTEAD, B.J. MOORE, J. KING, L. ROBERTS, A.R. JAMES, J. HUMPHREYS, S.L. HAWKINS, I.P. KING Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research, Plas Gogerddan, Aberystwyth, SY23 3EB, Wales

A genetic map combining molecular markers and phenotypic traits can elucidate the genetic control of the traits but few published maps have led to marker assisted selection.  We are developing "Breeder's Toolkits" based on highly localised maps.  Each toolkit will comprise a genotype carrying the desirable trait plus PCR based markers flanking the trait.  A range of such toolkits for different traits will enable the breeder to mix and match traits into a preferred background. Our approach to mapping a trait is to introgress the trait into an 'alien' background, then physically map the trait to a single introgressed chromosome segment by genomic in situ hybridisation.  The chromosome segment is then genetically mapped in isolation of the background by using only markers derived from the donor parent.