The UK's Guardian Newspaper has today, Tuesday 3^rd June 2014, once again ranked the University of Warwick in the country’s top 10 universities, ranking it at 9th overall in the UK (up one place from last year’s Guardian table), and also once again ranking Warwick as the top University in the West Midlands.

Warwick Crop Centre at the University of Warwick has won a five year contract from Defra to continue to host the UK Vegetable Genebank at the University’s Wellesbourne campus.

The Genebank is an internationally significant collection of almost 14,000 seed samples from different vegetable crops including carrot onion, lettuce cauliflower, cabbage and broccoli and closely related wild species.

The collection represents the genetic diversity in the genepool of each crop, and is a vital resource for researchers and plant breeders across the world.

'Vegetables are an important component of a healthy diet and the seed resources within the Genebank will support the development of new and improved varieties in the future', said Dr Charlotte Allender who leads the Vegetable Genebank project.

BBC's David Gregory visited the Warwick Crop Centre to film activities in the GRU (Genetic Resources Unit). The film is now available on You Tube at http://youtu.be/b9AmQ8wZvKg

Useful links:
Warwick Crop Centre
Genetic Resources Unit