Study of Structural Variants in Cacao Genomes Yields Clues about Plant Diversity
Published:24 Aug.2021 Source:Penn State
Molecular geneticists have known for about a decade that genomic structural variants can play important roles in the adaptation and speciation of both plants and animals, but their overall influence on the fitness of plant populations is poorly understood. That's partly because accurate population-level identification of structural variants requires analysis of multiple high-quality genome assemblies, which are not widely available.
In this study, the researchers investigated the fitness consequences of genomic structural variants in natural populations by analyzing and comparing chromosome-scale genome assemblies of 31 naturally occurring populations of Theobroma cacao, the long-lived tree species that is the source of chocolate. Among those 31 strains of cacao, they found more than 160,000 structural variants.