Transposable elements (TEs) account for more than 80% of the wheat genome. Although they represent a major obstacle for genomic studies, TEs are also a source of polymorphism and consequently of molecular markers such as insertion site-based polymorphism (ISBP) markers. Insertion site-based polymorphisms have been found to be a great source of genome-specific single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP...

Aneuploidy, a condition of unbalanced chromosome content, represents a large-effect mutation that bears significant relevance to human health and microbe adaptation. As such, extensive studies of aneuploidy have been conducted in unicellular model organisms and cancer cells. Aneuploidy also frequently is associated with plant polyploidization, but its impact on gene expression and its relevance...

The hypomethylated fraction of plant genomes is usually enriched in genes and can be selectively cloned using methylation filtration (MF). Therefore, MF has been used as a gene enrichment technology in sorghum and maize, where gene enrichment was proportional to genome size. Here we apply MF to a broad variety of plant species spanning a wide range of genome sizes. Differential methylation of g...

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) is a hexaploid species with A, B, and D ancestral genomes. Most bread wheat genes are present in the genome as triplicated homoeologous genes (homoeologs) derived from the ancestral species. Here, we report that both genetic and epigenetic alterations have occurred in the homoeologs of a wheat class E MADS box gene. Two class E genes are identified in wheat, whea...

haploid microspore-derived embryos (mdes) of wheat were obtained by in vitro androgenesis. these  embryos were employed to evaluate the transient expression of gus gene (uida) following particle bombardment. using the bio-rad pds-1000/he system, the physical parameters including rupture disk pressure (900, 1100 and 1350 psi); microprojectile travel distance (6 and 9 cm); gold particles size (0....

Sequencing whole plant genomes has advanced rapidly with the development of next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies and bioinformatics, enabling the study of large and complex genomes such as that of the hexaploid cereal, Triticum aestivum L. (bread wheat). Despite advances, however, confounding factors such as repetitive elements and low polymorphism still hinder sequencing attempts. Iso...

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) is an allohexaploid species, consisting of three subgenomes (A, B, and D). To study the molecular evolution of these closely related genomes, we compared the sequence of a 307-kb physical contig covering the high molecular weight (HMW)-glutenin locus from the A genome of durum wheat (Triticum turgidum, AABB) with the orthologous regions from the B genome of the s...

BACKGROUND Nitrogen uptake and the efficient absorption and metabolism of nitrogen are essential elements in attempts to breed improved cereal cultivars for grain or silage production. One of the enzymes related to nitrogen metabolism is glutamine-2-oxoglutarate amidotransferase (GOGAT). Together with glutamine synthetase (GS), GOGAT maintains the flow of nitrogen from NH4 (+) into glutamine an...

Despite some notable successes, only a fraction of the genetic variation available in wild relatives has been utilized to produce superior wheat varieties. This is as a direct result of the lack of availability of suitable high-throughput technologies to detect wheat/wild relative introgressions when they occur. Here, we report on the use of a new SNP array to detect wheat/wild relative introgr...

Aegilops tauschii Coss. is the D-genome donor to hexaploid bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) and is the most promising wild species as a genetic resource for wheat breeding. To study the population structure and diversity of 81 Ae. tauschii accessions collected from various regions of its geographical distribution, the genomic representation of these lines were used to develop a diversity array t...