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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Charleston, South Carolina » Vegetable Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #175213
Title: CONSTRUCTION OF A BAC LIBRARY FOR WATERMELON AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF A CUCURBITS-ARABIDOPSIS COMPARATIVE MAP

Author
item JOOBEUR, TAREK - N. C. STATE UNIVERSITY
item GUSMINI, GABRIELE - N. C. STATE UNIVERSITY
item OLIVER, MARC - SYNGENTA SEEDS
item ZHANG, XINGPING - SYNGENTA SEEDS
item Levi, Amnon
item XU, YONG - NATL ENG RES CTR, BEIJING
item WEHNER, TODD - N. C. STATE UNIVERSITY
item DEAN, RALPH - N. C. STATE UNIVERSITY

Submitted to: Plant and Animal Genome Conference Proceedings
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 12/28/2004
Publication Date: 1/14/2005
Citation: Joobeur, T., Gusmini, G., Oliver, M., Zhang, X., Levi, A., Xu, Y., Wehner, T.C., Dean, R.A. 2005. Construction of a BAC Library for Watermelon and the Development of a Cucurbits-Arabidopsis Comparative Map. Plant and Animal Genome XVIII Conference, pg 246.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Cultivated watermelon (Citrullus lanatus) is an economically important crop. However, limited genetic mapping studies have been undertaken for this species. Our objectives for this work are: (1) develop a watermelon linkage map with sequence-characterized genetic markers and (2) anchor the resulting linkage map to melon and Arabidopsis genomes to enable the transfer of information between these species. A watermelon bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) library was constructed from the inbred line 97103, presenting high fruit quality. The library contains a total of 92,160 clones with an average insert-size of 106 kbp, providing coverage of approximately 20 genome equivalents. To facilitate the construction of a watermelon-melon-Arabidopsis comparative map, 46 Arabidopsis and 45 melon probes, evenly distributed on their respective genomes, were selected. These probes are present as single/low copy number in their genome of origin. Sixty-eight percent and 71% of the Arabidopsis and melon probes identified positive clones, respectively, when hybridized to the BAC library. A total of 300 positive clones (an average of 4 clones per probe) were isolated and BAC end sequenced. The positive clones for different probes were also pooled and used to develop shotgun libraries. These libraries are being screened for the presence of simple sequence repeats (SSR) and positive clones sequenced. A preliminary linkage map is being constructed with 112 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) derived from an intraspecific cross between the breeding line 97103 and the US plant introduction (PI) 296341.