Plant, Animal & Microbe Genomes X Conference

January 12-16, 2002
Town & Country Convention Center
San Diego, CA

Poster: Genome Sequencing & ESTs
            

THE UK'S PUBLIC WHEAT TRANSCRIPTOME PROJECT

¹ IACR-Long Ashton Research Station, Department of Agricultural Sciences, University of Bristol, BS41 9AF, UK.

² School of Biological Sciences, University of Bristol, Woodland Road, Bristol, BS8 1UG, UK.

Grain development and to a lesser, but significant extent, plant development under abiotic stresses are areas of biology that are of considerable interest to the UK cereal research community. Within the BBSRC Investigating Gene Function (IGF) program we (http://www.cerealsdb.uk.net) are producing the resources required to investigate alterations in the transcriptome of hexaploid, winter wheat (var. Mercia) during these developmental processes. It is our aim to single pass sequence the cDNAs of 1000 randomly-picked clones from each of 35 cDNA libraries representing various stages of grain and plant development. Annotated sequencing results are stored in a publicly-accessible, online database at the above URL. This currently holds >5000 EST sequences which at present may be accessed via similarity (BLAST searches) to a user-submitted sequence or by the submission of key-word text queries through a user-friendly web interface. In 2002 we will begin high density microarraying of a wheat unigene set which will be made available to users at cost price. Interested cereal researchers will also be able to view online the expression profiles of selected ESTs as determined by microarray experiments carried out in our laboratory. This as an obvious aid to selecting physiologically-relevant ESTs for investigation. Such experiments will focus on grain development and plant responses to drought, waterlogging, salt-stress, reduced nitrogen stress and lowered temperatures. Current progress will be discussed.