Genomic Selection in Cereal Breeding

Genomic Selection (GS) is a method in plant breeding to predict the genetic value of untested lines based on genome-wide marker data. The method has been widely explored with simulated data and also in real plant breeding programs. However, the optimal strategy and stage for implementation of GS in a plant-breeding program is still uncertain. The accuracy of GS has proven to be affected by the data used in the GS model, including size of the training population, relationships between individuals, marker density, and use of pedigree information. GS is commonly used to predict the additive genetic value of a line, whereas non-additive genetics are often disregarded. In this review, we provide a background knowledge on genomic prediction models used for GS and a view on important considerations concerning data used in these models. We compare within- and across-breeding cycle strategies for implementation of GS in cereal breeding and possibilities for using GS to select untested lines as parents. We further discuss the difference of estimating additive and non-additive genetic values and its usefulness to either select new parents, or new candidate varieties.