棉纤维是重要的纺织原料。阐明棉纤维发育重要基因功能及作用机理，具有重要遗传与生物学意义，而且可为分子育种改良纤维品质提供优异基因资源。我们前期克隆获得一个棉纤维发育优势表达基因GhCFE，其同源基因在拟南芥、水稻等植物上功能均未知。前期在对其结构、表达、进化分析的基础上，异位表达转基因拟南芥表现根毛、叶毛显著变少、变短特征，该基因功能与毛发育显著相关。为了进一步揭示其在棉纤维发育中的功能，本项目拟在全基因组范围分析GhCFE家族成员结构，定位及表达特点，阐明可能的冗余功能影响；利用创制的GhCFE过量、敲除转基因棉花材料，分析其转基因后代的表型特征及分子机理；结合酵母双杂交，BIFC, 免疫共沉淀等种种分子生物学技术，对GhCFE的分子作用机理系统解析；筛选可用于育种利用的转GhCFE转基因材料。通过上述研究，发表高水平SCI论文2-3篇；申请国家发明专利1-2项；培养研究生2-3名。

Cotton fiber is one of the most important textile materials in the world. Clarifying the function and molecular mechanism of the critical genes not only has great significance in genetic and biological studies, but also provides excellent genetic resources to improve cotton fiber quality by means of molecular breeding. In previous study, we cloned a cotton fiber preferentially expressed protein gene, GhCFE, and the function of its homologous genes in Arabidopsis, rice and other plants are unknown, moreover, the ectopic expression of GhCFE in Arabidopsis retarded leaf trichome initiation and root hair elongation, indicating that GhCFE play an important role in trichome development. Based on this, the project intends to genome-wide analyze structure, localization and expression pattern of the members of the GhCFE super family, to clarify the possible redundancy impact. Furthermore, we devote ourselves not only to generate GhCFE overexpressing and suppressing transgenic cotton plants, combining the phenotypic characteristics of transgenic plants and various molecular biology techniques such as the yeast two-hybrid system, BIFC, co-immunoprecipitation to systematically elucidate the molecular mechanism of GhCFE, but also to screen GhCFE transgenic cotton plants for improving varieties targeted breeding traits. Subsequently, 2-3 SCI papers will be published, 1-2 national invention patents applied, and 2-3 graduates trained.