An In-Silico Functional Genomics Resource: Targeted Re-Sequencing Of Wheat TILLING Mutant Populations

The ability to study gene function in wheat is limited by the lack of available reverse genetic platforms. Although we have made TILLING mutant populations publicly available, TILLING of individual genes is still a laborious and slow process which requires bespoke primer design and genome specific amplicons. To accelerate the access to this sequence variation, we are combining genome capture with next generation sequencing to target a large portion of the wheat gene space in these mutant populations. The tetraploid TILLING population should be most useful for basic research projects as complete null mutants can be generated in a single cross, whereas the hexaploid population should be most useful for commercial bread wheat breeders. To achieve this we are developing an extended set of gene models and assigning them to homoeologous groups. We have used this information to perform preliminary capture experiments on mutants to assess the effect of coverage on SNP detection, effect of splicing junctions and homoeologous SNPs on capture efficiency, among other parameters. An update of these experiments will be presented. By sequencing the gene space in both tetraploid and hexaploid wheat TILLING populations we aim to catalogue the sequence variation in genes and provide an in-silico resource for researchers to study gene function and for breeders to deploy new variation in the field.