The transcriptional landscape of polyploid wheat
The coordinated expression of highly related homoeologous genes in polyploid species underlies the phenotypes of many of the world’s major crops. Here we combine extensive gene expression datasets to produce a comprehensive, genome-wide analysis of homoeolog expression patterns in hexaploid bread wheat. Bias in homoeolog expression varies between tissues, with ~30% of wheat homoeologs showing […]
Genome-Wide Transcription During Early Wheat Meiosis Is Independent of Synapsis, Ploidy Level, and the Ph1 Locus.
Polyploidization is a fundamental process in plant evolution. One of the biggest challenges faced by a new polyploid is meiosis, particularly discriminating between multiple related chromosomes so that only homologous chromosomes synapse and recombine to ensure regular chromosome segregation and balanced gametes. Despite its large genome size, high DNA repetitive content and similarity between homoeologous […]
Wheat—the cereal abandoned by GM
Despite wheat being a worldwide staple, no genetically modified (GM) wheat has been deployed. Here we analyse the socio-economic reasons why wheat has become a “GM orphan crop”, and discuss how technical advances in the discovery and cloning of resistance genes could be used to engineer resistance against major diseases causing widespread destruction in South […]
Speed breeding is a powerful tool to accelerate crop research and breeding
DFW researchers from JIC collaborated with researchers in the University of Queensland and The Plant Breeding Institute, Australia to develop protocols for rapid generation advancement, dubbed ‘speed breeding’. By manipulating the light regime, we were able to achieve significantly accelerated generation times (at least twice as fast) for a large range of crop plants (wheat, barley, […]