Microbial Genome Sequencing: Genome Sequence of Phytophthora Sojae

弗吉尼亚理工大学的布雷特泰勒和布鲁诺索布拉尔博士，与美国能源部联合基因组研究所的杰夫·布尔博士合作，获得了一笔赠款，用于创建大豆病原体大豆疫霉（Phytophthora sojae）的整个DNA序列的草图。 来自疫霉属的植物病原体引起多种作物物种以及森林和天然生态系统的破坏性疾病。 马铃薯病原体致病疫霉是爱尔兰马铃薯饥荒的原因，并且仍然是生物安全关注的破坏性病原体。 从表面上看，疫霉属病原体类似于真菌，但实际上它们属于一个名为Straviiles的组，与海藻（如海带和硅藻）关系最密切。 因此，传统的真菌控制措施往往无法对抗这些病原体。大豆疫霉被选为该项目的研究对象，因为它相对容易进行基因操纵。 该项目将与美国能源部资助的一个项目紧密结合，以确定橡树猝死病原体P. ramorum的序列草案。该项目的更广泛影响将包括直接培训博士后研究员和本科生，以及来自少数民族机构的多学科访问研究人员，团队-面向环境，强调实验和计算之间的协同互动所需的通信技能的发展生物学社区注释平台将为全球研究人员提供多学科的培训环境。这项研究将通过开发和公开提供第一个深入的来自草莓王国病原体的基因组资源来推进微生物基因组研究基础设施。该资源将为针对一组对全球生态系统、粮食安全和农业生产具有重大影响的病原体的新控制措施提供基础。这是一个微生物基因组测序奖，通过国家科学基金会和农业部之间的合作计划资助。

Drs. Brett Tyler and Bruno Sobral of Virginia Tech., in collaboration with Dr Jeff Boore of the DOE Joint Genome Institute have been awarded a grant to create a rough draft of the entire DNA sequence of the soybean pathogen Phytophthora sojae. Plant pathogens from the genus Phytophthora cause destructive diseases of an enormous variety of crop plant species as well as forests and native ecosystems. The potato pathogen P. infestans was responsible for the Irish potato famine, and is still a destructive pathogen of concern for biosecurity. Superficially, Phytophthora pathogens resemble fungi, but they in fact belong to a group called Stramenopiles that are most closely related to algae such as kelp and diatoms. Hence conventional fungus control measures often fail against these pathogens. P. sojae has been chosen for the project because it is relatively easy to genetically manipulate. This project will be tightly integrated with a project funded by the DOE to determine a draft sequence of the oak sudden death pathogen P. ramorum.The broader impact of the project will include direct training of postdoctoral fellows and undergraduates, and visiting researchers from minority institutions in a multidisciplinary, team-oriented environment that emphasizes development of the communications skills required for synergistic interactions between experimental and computational biology. The community annotation platform will provide a multi-disciplinary training environment for researchers world-wide. This research will advance the microbial genome research infrastructure by developing and making publicly available, the first in-depth genomic resource for a pathogen from the Stramenopile kingdom. This resource will provide a basis for new control measures against a group of pathogens which have major impacts on global ecosystems, food security and agricultural production. This is a Microbial Genome Sequencing Award funded through a collaborative program between the National Science Foundation and the Department of Agriculture.