Maize GXE and germplasm enhancement of maize (GEM) cooperation phase 3 -- the maize GXE consortium has collaborated with the germplasm enhancement of maize (GEM) project to evaluate and characterize…

The Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service awarded the University of Wisconsin System a cooperative agreement valued at $1.098 million on September 18, 2025, under the Agricultural Research Basic and Applied Research program (CFDA 10.001). The award funds Phase 3 of the Maize GXE and Germplasm Enhancement of Maize (GEM) cooperation, which evaluates and characterizes exotic maize genetic variation across diverse environmental conditions to improve crop performance. The project operates a distributed testing platform that has evaluated more than 6,000 unique maize hybrids across more than 300 environments since 2014, measuring 11 core agronomic and phenological traits and collecting environmental and plot-level data for each testing location. Phase 3 advances the collaboration by applying innovative breeding technologies to develop and characterize germplasm sources, standardizing the collection of large-scale phenotypic, environmental, and genotypic data across geographically distributed collaborators, and developing tools to improve data accessibility and utility. The project also sponsors public prediction competitions to crowd-source new approaches. Performance occurs at the University of Wisconsin - Madison campus in Madison, Wisconsin, with a period of performance from September 18, 2025, through September 17, 2030.

Maize GXE and germplasm enhancement of maize (GEM) cooperation phase 3 -- the maize GXE consortium has collaborated with the germplasm enhancement of maize (GEM) project to evaluate and characterize the utility of exotic variation across wide range of environmental conditions. A goal of this effort has been to integrate new phenotyping tools, environmental characterization, and hybrid evaluation to improve crop performance in current and anticipated environments. The maize GXE project provides a distributed platform for the testing and deployment of tools and technologies to improve our understanding of the interaction of environment (including management) and diverse maize hybrids on the expression of economically important phenotypes. Since 2014, the maize GXE project has evaluated more than 6,000 unique maize hybrids across more than 300 environments. This multi-collaborator project has measured 11 core agronomic and phenological traits for each hybrid evaluated and has collected environmental and plot level data for each testing location. The GEM program is a public-private partnership focused on expanding the germplasm base of commercial maize germplasm in north america through the incorporation of exotic sources of genetic variability. This cooperation is advancing into a second phase more specifically focused on applying innovative breeding technologies to develop and characterize relevant sources of germplasm, to coordinate and advance the application of new technologies to improve the efficiency of measuring specific phenotypes and methods to acquire, analyze and interpret the data collected to improve prediction ability. The project is also focused on developing resources to standardized the collection of large scale phenotypic, environmental and genotypic data across a geographically distributed set of collaborators and tools to facilitate data accessibility and utility. Finally, the project sponsors public prediction competitions to crowd-source new approaches to predicting hybrid yields across different environments.