Grass Genomic Synteny Illuminates Plant Genome Function and Evolution

The genic colinearity of grass genetic maps, physical maps, and contiguous genomic sequences has been a major contributor to almost two decades of study into the structure and evolution of grass genomes. This research has led to the discovery of all of the major phenomena responsible for the rapid evolution of flowering plant genomes. These processes include polyploidy, transposable element (TE) amplification, TE-driven genome rearrangement, and DNA removal by unequal homologous recombination and illegitimate recombination. The great variety in angiosperm genome structure is largely an outcome of differences in the specificities, frequencies, and amplitudes of these common genome-altering processes. Future emphasis now needs to shift to harnessing an even broader range of studied species, and to use this phylogenomic perspective to uncover the nature and functions of the genes that are shared by particular lineages and those that set each individual species apart as a unique biological entity.