Abstract

Functional Genomic Studies in the Versatile Moss, Physcomitrella patens

Meenu Kapoor, Principal Investigator, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University

Liverworts, hornworts and mosses represent the early plants that colonized land ~450-500 million years ago. Since then, mosses have had tremendous impact on different ecosystems and have been the subject of different studies in the field of plant functional genomics and industrial research. Among the mosses, Physcomitrella patens has emerged as an established non-vascular plant that is sometimes referred to as the “green yeast’ because of the high rate of homologous recombination in its genome. This property of P. patens together with efficient gene targeting system and the ease of transformation has resulted in generation of stable and transient transgenic plants that has made it one of the most promising model plants for genomic research. P. patens is known to inhabit diverse habitats such as the Antarctica and the deserts. The molecular basis of its resilience to these ecosystems has been under investigation with the view to exploit its abiotic stress tolerance potential for possible improvements in agriculture. In the past decade or so, large amount of genome-wide transcriptome, methylome and proteome data have been generated that have initiated comparative genomic studies to understand the biological processes that are conserved between flowering plants and mosses and those that are unique to mosses. With the view to complement these genome-wide studies with reverse genetic studies and to understand the contribution of individual genes, we undertook epigenetic studies and dissected the role of core components of the DNA methylation machinery in abiotic stress tolerance of P. patens. Functional genomic studies related to the chromomethylases, PpCMT, DNA methylase 2, PpDNMT2 and the chromatin remodeling protein, PpDDM1 will be discussed.