Genomics approaches to unlock the high yield potential of cassava, a tropical model plant

Abstract

Cassava, a tropical food, feed and biofuel crop, has great capacity for biomass accumulation and an extraordinary efficiency in water use and mineral nutrition, which makes it highly suitable as a model plant for tropical crops. However, the understanding of the metabolism and genomics of this important crop is limited. The recent breakthroughs in the genomics of cassava, including whole-genome sequencing and transcriptome analysis, as well as advances in the biology of photosynthesis, starch biosynthesis, adaptation to drought and high temperature, and resistance to virus and bacterial diseases, are reviewed here. Many of the new developments have come from comparative analyses between a wild ancestor and existing cultivars. Finally, the current challenges and future potential of cassava as a model plant are discussed.

Keywords

cassava / genomics / yield potential / adaptability / tropical model

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Acknowledgement

This work was funded by the National Basic Research Program of China (2010CB126601), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31261140363 and 31171230), the China Agriculture Research System (CARS-12), the National International Science and Technology Cooperation Plan (2011DFB31690), and the National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (2012AA101204-2).

Compliance with ethics guidelinesƒShengkui Zhang, Ping’an Ma, Haiyan Wang, Cheng Lu, Xin Chen, Zhiqiang Xia, Meiling Zou, Xinchen Zhou and Wenquan Wang declare that they have no conflict of interest or financial conflicts to disclose.ƒThis article is a review and does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg