WOOD FORMATION IN LOBLOLLY PINE: A GENOMIC APPROACH

¹ Forest Biotechnology Group, Department of Forestry, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695-8008 USA

² Institute of Forest Genetics, USDA Forest Service, Department of Environmental Horticulture, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA 95616 USA

³ Texas A & M University, Department of Forest Science and Crop Biotechnology Center, College Station, TX 77843-2123 USA

⁴ Academic Computing and Bioinformatics, AHC, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN USA

⁵ Institute of Paper Science and Technology, 500 10th Street, N. W., Atlanta, GA 30318 USA

Genomic methods are being applied to learn the molecular basis of wood formation in loblolly pine. ESTs are being obtained from differentiating xylem during rapid growth. One purpose of this project is to identify a large number of ESTs and to analyze the time and level of expression for each EST using cDNA microarrays. The second goal of the project is the association of variation in known genes with variation in wood properties - to do this, it will be necessary to map large numbers of ESTs and to learn more about gene function. The current status of this project will be discussed.