Functional genomics of the model horticultural crop, Micro-Tom.

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Functional genomics is lately developing because all DNA sequences of the genome have been clarified in Arabidopsis thaliana that is the model plant. On the other hand, functional genomics in horticultural crops is not easy because there are so many species involved in horticultural crops. Therefore, an advanced research by using some model horticultural crops is needed. Arabidopsis thaliana is not useful as the model of the fruit trees and the fruit vegetables.Tomato is not only commercially important but also useful as a model horticultural plant because its transformation is comparatively easy ; its physiological information is abundant ; there is expressed sequence tag (EST) containing more than 100,000 sequences. However, there are some problems, which are the large plant size and the long generation time. Micro-Tom is a miniature tomato that is almost genetically identical to the cultivation tomatoes. Micro-Tom could be a good model plant because of its small size (5-10 cm of plant height), short generation time, and high transformation efficiency. Thus, Micro-Tom was used in this experiment as a model horticultural crop for molecular genetics.A high degree of availability of Micro-Tom as a model experimental plant was confirmed through the analysis of proton pump, pathogen response, etc. in this research. Moreover, the research on various horticultural crops such as the fruit vegetables and fruit trees was also carried out. In the future, the information and the technique of functional genomic developed using Micro-Tom are expected to be applied widely in various horticultural crops.