Breeding has been used in agriculture to produce superior plants and animals for over a century. Microbes, such as yeast, can also be crossbred to create hybrids with superior qualities (i.e. hybrid vigour). Why these hybrids perform better is not fully known. A better understanding of hybrid vigour is essential for improving efficiency and predictability of yeast breeding for strain development. In this project we want to investigate how genome size and variability of yeast hybrids affects their ability to outperform their parent strains, particularly in environments that one is likely to find in the industry. This will be done by creating and characterizing hundreds of hybrids between diverse parent strains. We will model the relationship between genetic factors in parent strains and performance of hybrids to improve predictability. This knowledge will be used to improve, through breeding, the efficiency of industrial yeast that have been modified to produce bioplastic precursors.

2023

2027