Plant & Animal Genomes XVII Conference

January 10-14, 2009
Town & Country Convention Center
San Diego, CA

The UK-China Sequencing Project: Exploiting The B. rapa Genome Sequence For Oilseed Rape Improvement

Ian Bancroft¹ , Martin Trick¹ , Nizar Drou¹ , Fiona Fraser¹ , Eleni Soumpourou¹ , Foo Cheung² , Jee-Young Park³ , Soo-Jin Kwon⁴ , Yong Pyo Lim³ , Rod Scott⁵ , Chris Town² , Graham King⁶ , Chris Rawlings⁶ , Guy Barker⁷ , Jeanette Selby⁷ , Yan Long⁸ , Chunyu Zhang⁸ , Ruiyuan Li⁸ , Jinling Meng⁸

¹  John Innes Centre, Norwich Research Park, Colney, Norwich NR4 7UH, U.K.

²  The J. Craig Venter Institute, 9704 Medical Center Drive, Rockville, MD 20850, USA

³  Chungnam National University, Daejeon 305-764, Korea

⁴  National Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology, Suwon, 441-857, Korea

⁵  University of Bath, Bath, BA2 7AY, U.K .

⁶  Rothamsted Research, Harpenden, Hertfordshire AL5 2JQ. U.K.

⁷  Warwick HRI Wellesbourne, Warwick, CV35 9EF, UK

⁸  National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan 430070, China

The U.K. and China have joined the Brassica rapa Genome Sequencing project (BrGSP). Working together in a highly integrated project, we are using the agreed strategy of the BrGSP to sequence the gene space of linkage groups A1 and A8. In addition, we have sufficient resources to contribute towards sequencing of the gene space of linkage group A4 and to provide some additional seed BAC sequences. All of the sequence data are being placed immediately into the public domain. Value is being added by performing an automated annotation of all genome sequence data produced by the BrGSP (available via the Brassica Genome Gateway site) as it is placed into the public domain, and will develop an Ensembl Brassica genome browser and database (BrassEnsembl). In addition, we are end-sequencing a B. napus BAC library to facilitate transitions between the B. rapa genome sequence and the oilseed rape genome. In the presentation, an overview of the progress of the project will be presented. Comparative genomics studies have rapidly advanced our understanding of the evolutionary processes that have shaped the macrostructure of the genomes of Brassica species. We have undertaken comparative studies, at the sequence level, in order to better understand how to exploit the B. rapa genome sequence for B. napus improvement. The results of our recent studies comparing the structures of homoeologous segments of the genomes of B. rapa, B. oleracea and B. napus will be presented.