ARS | Publication request: Genomic resources for valuable woody ornamental landscape plants such as hydrangea macrophylla

Submitted to: Plant and Animal Genome VX Conference Abstracts
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: January 15, 2011
Publication Date: January 15, 2011
Citation: Rinehart, T.A., Reed, S.M., Scheffler, B.E. 2011. Genomic resources for valuable woody ornamental landscape plants such as hydrangea macrophylla. Plant and Animal Genome VX Conference Abstracts. W396.

Technical Abstract: New and improved ornamental landscape plants are typically produced by conventional breeding. Unfortunately, long generation times for woody plants can significantly slow progress. Incorporating genomic and biotechnology resources provides more information when designing breeding strategies and accelerates screening and selection of new plants. The ultimate goal is marker-assisted breeding, which provides the opportunity to screen plants at a young age for multiple traits of interest. Genomic resources may also be powerful tools to address challenges such as potential invasiveness, environmental tolerance, emerging diseases and insects, and rapidly changing consumer preference. We developed SSR markers for hydrangea to assess the genetic diversity of available germplasm, create a roadmap for wide hybridization, verify inter- and intraspecific crosses, and generate a preliminary linkage map for Hydrangea macrophylla. We are currently assembling transcriptome sequences from 454 GS-FLX Titanium sequencing of leaf, stem, and flower transcripts, which will allow us to develop SNP markers for high resolution mapping and a reference set of expressed genes for functional studies. There are upwards of 100 woody genera grown in nurseries as ornamental landscape plants. As the cost of genomics methods decrease, we will apply these methods to other economically important crops such as Cornus, Lagerstroemia, Cercis, and azalea.