Kelly Houston

Kelly is a geneticist who has worked in barley genetics research since completing her PhD. Much of her research has been on two main aspects of grain composition, the plant cell wall (including (1,3;1,4)-β- glucan, arabinoxylan and phenolic acids), and micronutrient content. She identifies and characterizes genes responsible for these traits using a powerful combination of high-density marker sets to carry out statistical genetic analysis and genetic resources (including natural germplasm, mutants and CRISPR-Cas9 gene edited lines) to learn more about how these genes ultimately influence the trait of interest. Kelly has utilizing georeferenced datasets to understand more about genetic adaptation to a range of environmental conditions and how this can be applied to facilitate the development of germplasm suitable for future predicted climates.