Long-term storage of rye at the National Seed Storage Laboratory

摘要

The National Seed Storage Laboratory (NSSL), US Department of Agriculture, located in Fort Collins, Colorado has been in operation since 1958 to provide long-term storage of genetic resources. Physical facilities were modernized and expanded fourfoldin 1992. High-security vaults have the capacity to provide protection from natural disasters including floods, tornadoes, fires and earthquakes for about one and a half million samples. Seed samples are dried to equilibrium at about 10°C and 30% relative humidity to obtain the optimum seed moisture for long-term storage and packaged in moisture-resistant containers for conventional storage at -18°C or in plastic tubes for cryostorage over liquid nitrogen at about -160°C. The US National Plant Germplasm System collections include 1924 accessions of rye. High-quality seed samples of 1628 of these accessions were obtained from the cooperative Rye Seed Regeneration for Long-Term Storage project with the Botanical Garden, Warsaw, Poland. Of the 1881 accessions in the base collection at NSSL, 83% are in cryostorage and 17% are in conventional storage. Seed quality is excellent with 92% of the samples having above 84% germination, and 99% having >64% germination. Seed numbers are adequate with 98% of thesamples having more than 1500 seeds.