Camcore is a non-profit, international tree breeding organization. It primarily serves the private forestry sector to ensure that it has access to a broad genetic base of the best-adapted and productive species for use in plantation forestry programs in the tropics, subtropics and subtemperate regions. It now has 29 active members in 11 countries in the Americas and Africa.
Camcore was formed by private industry in 1980 and is headquartered at North Carolina State University. The program works internationally with four tree genera: Pines, Eucalypts, Gmelina and Teak, and with several threatened coniferous species native to the southern US. Camcore differs from other domestic and international tree improvement efforts in that one of its major emphases, in addition to breeding, is the establishment of ex situ conservation plantings of tree species and populations. In addition to the active members, Camcore has a staff of 10 professionals who are University employees. The staff organizes and guides members in projects in four broad working groups and associated activities listed below:
- Tree Breeding: Collecting seeds, establishing and analyzing genetic trials, selecting superior trees, establishing seed orchards, and making controlled and hybrid crosses.
- Conservation: Locating and evaluating conservation status of natural populations, assessing genetic diversity of species, establishing ex-situ conservation plantings.
- Species Characterization: Screening disease, drought and frost resistance, evaluating wood quality, determining species nutrient baselines, researching reproductive physiology.
- Enabling Technologies: We test various technologies for use in our projects. Some current projects include: adapting NIR (near infrared) techniques to tissue analysis, utilizing molecular markers (SNPS, microsatellites) for genetic diversity studies, using electrolyte leakage to measure frost resistance, influencing flowering with hormone treatments.