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Secretory and glandular trichomes (SGTs) are found on the surfaces of above ground plant tissues of approximately one third of all vascular plant species. Humans are familiar with these structures because they contain the essential oils that give cooking herbs their distinctive smell and taste. In addition to making foods taste better, these uni- and multi-cellular appendages are proposed to play a critical role in plant protection against various environmental stresses including herbivore attack, pathogen infection, extreme temperature, and excessive light.

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Updated 11/09

Funding for the project commenced 1 September 2006 and the collaborating groups have been engaged in a number of different activities. Most of our efforts are focused on five representative species: Solanum lycopersicum (tomato cultivar M82), S. habrochaites (LA1777), S. pennellii (LA0716), S. pimpinellifolium (LA1589) and S. peruvianum (LA1708).

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Recent publications from the project:

Schilmiller*, A.L., I. Schauvinhold*, M. Larson, R. Xu, A.L. Charbonneau, A. Schmidt, R.L. Last and E. Pichersky 2009. Monoterpenes in the glandular trichomes of tomato are synthesized via a neryl diphosphate intermediate rather than geranayl diphosphate. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., 106:10865-10870.

To read this paper click here.

To read a commentary on this article by J. Bohlmann and J. Gershenzon click here.

Schilmiller, A.L., R.L. Last and E. Pichersky. 2008. Harnessing plant trichome biochemistry for the production of useful compounds. Plant J. 54:702-711.
To read this paper click here.

DellaPenna, D and R.L. Last 2008. The expanding universe of genomics enabled plant biochemistry. Science. 320:479-481.
To read this paper click here.

For past news click here

2.3 Million project EST sequences available
in GenBank.

454 ESTs:
ESTs of total trichomes of S. lycopersicum LA3475 (M82 cultivated tomato) are available as experiment SRX004021.

ESTs of type VI glands of S. lycopersicum LA3475 (M82 cultivated tomato) are available as experiment SRX004022.

ESTs of total trichomes of S. pennellii LA0716 are available as experiment SRX011590.

ESTs of total trichomes of S. habrochaites LA1777 are available as experiment SRX011591.

ESTs of type VI glands of S. habrochaites LA1777 are available as experiment SRX011592.

ESTs of type VI glands of S. pimpinellifolium LA1589  are available as experiment SRX011593.

ESTs of type VI glands of S. arcanum LA1708 are available as experiment SRX011594.

Sanger ESTs:
A total of 26,000 Sanger EST sequences from the project are available from GenBank. These are from S. habrochaites PI126449 type VI glands, S. habrochaites LA1777 types I and IV glands, S. lycopersicum LA3475 types I and VII and S. pennellii LA0716 types IV and VI glands.

Tentative consensus assemblies for M82 trichome ESTs are available for search here. Note that these contigs are computationally determined and not experimentally validated.

Many thanks to Matt Larson (MSU RTSF and project member) for analysis and submission of these data.

The Solanum Trichome Project is a collaborative functional genomics project funded by a National Science Foundation grant to Michigan State University, The University of Michigan and The University of Arizona. Did you find a bug or an error? Please let us know.

 


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