Horizontal plant biology on the rise.docVIP

Meeting report ‘Horizontal’ plant biology on the rise Yves Van de Peer Address: Department of Plant Systems Biology, Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology (VIB), Ghent University, Technologiepark 927, B-9052 Ghent, Belgium. E-mail: Yves.vandepeer@psb.ugent.be Published: 21 December 2004 Genome Biology 2004, 6:302 The electronic version of this article is the complete one and can be found online at /2004/6/1/302 ? 2004 BioMed Central Ltd Genome Initiative, which is studying the genomes of toma- A report on the Plant Genomics European Meeting (Plant- toes, potatoes and their relatives. One aim is to have a draft GEMS2004), Lyon, France, 22-25 September 2004. of the tomato genome by the end of 2006. Other questions to be tackled are how a common set of genes and proteins gave rise to such a wide range of morphologically and ecologically The annual meetings on plant genomics, of which Plant- GEMS2004 was the third, are now among the most impor- tant plant meetings in Europe. This year, almost 600 scientists from more than 30 different countries participated, and the meeting was supported by the national programs in plant genomics in France, Germany, the UK and the Nether- lands, and by the French, German, Spanish and British research ministries. This report focuses in particular on the strengths and expectations of comparative genomics in plants, an area that is only now starting to be fully exploited. distinct species in the Solanaceae, and how a deeper under- standing of the genetic basis of diversity can be harnessed to better meet the nutritional needs of society in an environ- mentally friendly way. Comparing crops A new genome sequence is that of poplar - officially released only the day before the meeting. The poplar genome is approximately 500 megabase-pairs (Mbp), divided between 19 chromosomes. Very preliminary analyses report more than