The paper of "Structural variation reshapes population gene expression and trait variation in 2,105 Brassica napus accessions" has been published on Nature Genetics. Congratulations!
On November 5, the internationally renowned academic journal Nature Genetics published online a collaborative research achievement between the Oil Crops Research Institute and Huazhong Agricultural University. The research reveals the patterns and mechanisms of how structural variations in the rapeseed genome regulate gene expression and phenotypic diversity. It also introduces a new high-throughput method for identifying polyploid genome structural variations, providing new theoretical and practical pathways for crop genomics research and trait improvement.
The researchers explained that genomic structural variations play a critical role in the phenotypic diversity and adaptive evolution of species. Understanding the relationship between structural variations and agronomic traits, and applying this knowledge and technology to crop improvement, is of great significance for discovering and creating superior germplasm resources, increasing crop yield, improving crop quality, and enhancing crop resistance. However, due to the large number of repetitive sequences and the complex variations in the polyploid crop genomes, large-scale detection of structural variations is often inaccurate and costly. This has led to a lack of systematic studies on the regulation of gene expression and trait formation by structural variations at the species level, which has become a bottleneck restricting the development of modern biological breeding.
To overcome this bottleneck, the Innovation Program of Oil Crops Genomics & Disease Resistance Improvement at the Oil Crops Research Institute, in collaboration with the rapeseed team at Huazhong Agricultural University, spent more than eight years developing a new high-throughput, high-precision method to identify large structural variations in polyploid genomes. Using tetraploid rapeseed as the study subject, the team conducted a comprehensive analysis of genome-wide structural variations and their regulation of gene expression and phenotypic variation at the species level for the first time. They summarized eight key molecular regulatory mechanisms. This research not only provides an efficient, large-scale strategy for identifying and analyzing genetic variations and their functions, but also reveals the coupled mechanism of synthesis and transport of the rapeseed’s defense metabolites, glucosinolates. It has successfully created breakthrough, high-resistance, high-quality rapeseed germplasm resources, providing valuable genetic resources and superior germplasm materials for rapeseed breeding. Additionally, this study offers new research ideas and strategies for rapeseed genomics, with significant scientific and practical implications.
The study was supported by the National Key R&D Program, the National Natural Science Foundation, and the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences’ Science and Technology Innovation Project, etc.
Full text article link: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-024-01957-7