At present, the Australian rice industry is focused mainly on Southern NSW. With increasing prevalence of drought on the current production areas, it is essential for the rice industry to build its capacity by exploring growing sites in Northern Queensland. However, new growing sites pose novel challenges, and maintaining the profitability and premium quality of Australian rice is at risk. In this presentation, the application of comprehensive metabolite profiling on identifying volatile compounds that contribute to pleasant and unpleasant flavours in rice, and consequently to consumer preference, will be discussed. Further, the environmental and management processes that trigger the production of these compounds, and the possible molecular mechanisms of their production will be presented.
Dara is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the School of Agriculture and Food Sciences, The University of Queensland. During her PhD, she worked on determining biomarkers and genetic markers for rice aroma and flavour through metabolomic profiling and genome-wide association mapping (GWAS). Her current research includes the application of metabolomics in quality evaluation of food and as selection tools for crop improvement. Being exposed to the fields of metabolomics, genomics and molecular biology, her goal is to integrate multi-‘omic platforms in understanding complex traits in plants.