A multinational effort
A collaborative effort between Chinese/European/Chilean members of the grapevine community have unpuzzled the complete telomere-to-telomere sequence of grapevine; ‘The complete reference genome for grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) genetics and breeding’ made the cover of Horticulture Research.
The T2T gap-free reference genome was assembled for the cultivar PN40024 using PacBio HiFi long reads. The fully annotated complete reference genome constitutes an important resource for grapevine genetic studies and breeding programs.
Having a complete reference genome is not just filling thousands of previously existent gaps, but having precise sequences of repetitive regions. This information may help increase the mapping efficiency and facilitate variant calling & genotyping, therefore assisting in population genetics and quantitative genetic analyses.
A genome with more features
Yongfeng Zhou (Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen-CAAS), Xiao Hua (Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences), Zong-Ming Cheng (College of Horticulture, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing) and Camille Rustenholz (INRAE Colmar) led the team who obtained a gap-free reference genome, annotating 67% repetitive sequences, 19 centromeres and 36 telomeres.
Around 400 gene clusters were identified, with associations to complex traits, such as aroma and disease resistance.
Highly homozygous, but not entirely
Nine genomic hotspots of heterozygocity were found, corroborating the findings of PN40024.v4. The previously ‘manually curated’ annotation is currently being transferred into this assembly. Both represent the gold standard assembly and annotation for the grapevine community.
PN40024 is actually a white cultivar
Despite originally-thought to be derived from the black-skinned cultivar Pinot Noir, ‘PN40024’ is white-skinned and was derived from nine selfings of the black-skinned cv. ‘Helfensteiner’ (a cross from Pinot Noir and Schiava Grossa), as demonstrated in the release of the forth assembly (PN40024.v4). Image Credits: INRAE Colmar photograph collection.
Press Releases
Here there is a collection of press releases regarding the T2T assembly.
