Date

Tuesday 22 November 2016

Time

12:30-13:30 (ADST)

Venue

CSIRO: Black Mountain B1 Lecture Theatre, St Lucia QBP Level 3 South telepresence room (3.323), Floreat-B1b-F1-R09-Boardroom

Speaker

Sigrid Lehnert, Group Leader, CSIRO Agriculture & Food

Synopsis

DNA technologies have taken the global dairy industry by storm in recent years, with almost all elite dairy bulls now receiving a DNA-based prediction of their genetic merit at birth.  The beef industry can utilise the same genomics tools and resources as the dairy cattle industry, however the uptake of genetics and genomics, particularly in the north Australian beef industry is poor.  My talk will explore the reasons for this lack in adoption, and detail some of the approaches the Livestock Genomics group is trialling to accelerate the rate at which genomics technology can have impact on the productivity and sustainability of the Australian beef industry.

Biography

Dr Sigrid Lehnert started out as a developmental biologist (Zoology, University of Glasgow), and obtained her Ph.D. in Genetics at University College, London in 1990.  She started as a postdoc on the “Gene Shears” initiative with CSIRO Biomolecular Engineering in North Ryde that same year, and was involved in transgenic mouse experimentation aimed at changing the sex ratio of domestic animals.  After moving to Brisbane to join CSIRO Tropical Animal Production in 1993, Sigrid acquired experience in fields as diverse as cattle reproductive technology, and prawn molecular genetics and genomics.  She led CSIRO’s first forays into cattle genomics, by constructing cDNA libraries, EST databases and cDNA microarrays that underpinned pioneering studies of the cattle muscle transcriptome.  For the past ten years she has led R&D in applied genomics for the Australian beef industry.  She is Research Group Leader of CSIRO Agriculture and Food’s Research Program #4 “Livestock Genomics” group, and is based at the Queensland Biosciences Precinct St Lucia campus.

 

This is a public seminar.

NO visitor pass is required for non-CSIRO attendees going to Lecture Theatre Building 1.