Development of genomics-based genotyping platforms and their applications in rice breeding

Breeding by design has been an aspiration of researchers in the plant sciences for a decade. With the rapid development of genomics-based genotyping platforms and available of hundreds of functional genes/alleles in related to important traits, however, it may now be possible to turn this enduring ambition into a practical reality. Rice has a relatively simple genome comparing to other crops, and its genome composition and genetic behavior have been extensively investigated. Recently, rice has been taken as a model crop to perform breeding by design. The essential process of breeding by design is to integrate functional genes/alleles in an ideal genetic background, which requires high throughput genotyping platforms to screen for expected genotypes. With large amount of genome resequencing data and high-throughput genotyping technologies available, quite a number of genomics-based genotyping platforms have been developed. These platforms are widely used in genetic mapping, integration of target traits via marker-assisted backcrossing (MABC), pyramiding, recurrent selection (MARS) or genomic selection (GS). Here, we summarize and discuss recent exciting development of rice genomics-based genotyping platforms and their applications in molecular breeding.