14 ERA-CAPS Regulating Tomato quality through Expression (RegulaTomE)

RegulaTomE的双重目标是确定决定番茄品质性状的代谢途径转录调控的重要性，并在分子水平上识别这种转录调控因子。选定的品质性状包括影响货架期和营养价值的抗氧化能力，以及影响感官特性和货架期的水果风味和过熟。还将确定有助于非生物胁迫耐受性的基因，以实现更有营养、更稳定和更可持续的作物的综合目标。RegulaTomE将利用野生种与番茄杂交产生的导入系(ILS)中的自然变异来评估转录调控的重要性，识别额外的调控基因，并评估潜在的遗传和表观遗传变异。RegulaTomE还将评估直接或间接利用大部分未开发的野生物种资源进行作物改良的自然变异的潜力。为了利用番茄茄子鉴定调节代谢途径的基因，并获得尽可能多的遗传和表观遗传变异以应用于基因发现和番茄改良，需要开发资源，包括番茄茄子基因组参考序列和代谢产物，DNA甲基化和IL果实的转录组图谱。由此产生的数据将通过现有的公共数据库不受限制地提供，为社区进一步开发尚未开发的番茄自然变异提供宝贵的资源。RegulaTomE将导致调控基因的识别(就基础理解而言是一个重要的进展)，并为水果品质的代谢工程提供新的工具。更直接的是，番茄果实品质的自然变异可以通过直接导入栽培品种或通过鉴定目标基因座和相应的等位基因变异间接应用于番茄改良，对番茄育种种质和其他番茄近缘品种的品质性状有积极的贡献。来自五个欧洲主要组织和两所美国大学的科学家合作，在肉质水果和农业/园艺创新方面产生了世界领先的研究，将使工具和资源的开发达到国家层面无法获得的规模。RegulaTomE的成果将以基因、目标基因和分子标记的形式提供一个理解框架和工具，以支持在其他园艺作物中开发更长货架期、更有营养和更有味道的肉质水果。这些资源的有效性和在RegulaTomE上获得的知识的重要性将确保该项目直接促进粮食安全和可持续水果种植。

The twin objectives of RegulaTomE are to determine the importance of transcriptional regulation of the metabolic pathways defining quality traits in tomato and to identify such transcriptional regulators at the molecular level. The selected quality traits include those determining antioxidant capacity which impacts shelf life and nutritional value as well as those determining fruit flavor and over-ripening which influence organoleptic properties and shelf-life. Loci contributing to abiotic stress tolerance will also be identified toward the combined goals of more nutritious, stable and sustainable crops. RegulaTomE will use the natural variation available in introgression lines (ILs) resulting from wild species crosses to tomato to assess the importance of transcriptional regulation, identify additional regulatory genes and assess underlying genetic and epigenetic variation. RegulaTomE will additionally assess the potential for direct or indirect use of natural variation from a largely untapped wild species resource for crop improvement. To identify genes regulating metabolic pathways using the Solanum lycopersicoides ILs, and to capture as much genetic and epigenetic variation as possible for application to gene discovery and tomato improvement, resources need to be developed, including a genome reference sequence for S. lycopersicoides and metabolite, DNA methylation and transcriptome profiles of IL fruit. Resulting data will be made available without restriction via existing public databases, providing invaluable resources for the community to exploit further the untapped natural variation in S.lycopersicoides. RegulaTomE will lead to regulatory gene identification (an important advance in terms of fundamental understanding), and provide new tools for metabolic engineering of fruit quality. More immediately, the natural variation in fruit quality revealed by the S.lycopersicoides ILs could be applied to tomato improvement either directly through introgression into cultivated varieties or indirectly through the identification of target loci and corresponding allelic variation making positive contributions to quality traits within S. lycopersicum breeding germplasm and in other close relatives of tomato. The cooperation of scientists from five major European organisations and two US Universities producing world-leading research on fleshy fruit and agricultural/horticultural innovation will allow the development of tools and resources on a scale unavailable at a national level. The outputs of RegulaTomE will provide a framework of understanding as well as tools, in the form of genes, target loci and molecular markers, to support development of longer shelf-life, more nutritious and more flavorsome fleshy fruits in other horticultural crops. The effectiveness of these resources and the significance of the knowledge acquired on RegulaTomE will ensure that the project contributes directly to food security and sustainable fruit cultivation.