GENE DISCOVERY FOR ADAPTIVE TRAITS AND CANDIDATE GENE VARIATION IN DOUGLAS FIR

¹ Institute of Forest Genetics, Pacific Southwest Research Station, USDA Forest Service, Department of Environmental Horticulture, University of California at Davis, 1 Shields Avenue, Davis, CA 95616, USA

² Institute of Forest Genetics, Pacific Southwest Research Station, USDA Forest Service, 2480 Carson Road, Placerville, CA 95667, USA

³ Molecular Tree Breeding Services LLC, 21040 Flumerfelt Rd, Centralia, WA 98531

⁴ Department of Forest Science, Oregon State University, 321 Richardson Hall, Corvallis, OR 97331-5752, USA

⁵ Pacific Northwest Research Station, USDA Forest Service, 3200 SW Jefferson Way, Corvallis, OR 97331-4401

Our task is to identify and characterize the specific genes that underlie QTLs controlling several important adaptive quantitative traits in Douglas-fir such as cold tolerance and phenology. cDNA libraries have been constructed and sequenced in several conifer species, including ca. 11,000 ESTs in Douglas-fir, and queried for genes known to contribute to specific physiological processes. Many of these EST markers have been mapped in multiple pine species, Norway spruce and Douglas-fir, and a high degree of co-linearity between linkage groups among species has been found. Our current goals are to (1) select potential candidate genes based on their physiological role and expression data, (2) amplify and sequence them in the population sample, (3) analyze their nucleotide diversity, (4) select the most informative SNPs for association study, and (5) place known candidate genes on the existing Douglas-fir QTL map. Data on cold tolerance related candidate genes are presented.