Chromosome-level Thlaspi arvense genome provides new tools for translational research and for a newly domesticated cash cover crop of the cooler climates
Thlaspi arvense (field pennycress) is being domesticated as a winter annual oilseed crop capable of improving ecosystems and intensifying agricultural productivity without increasing land use. It is a selfing diploid with a short life cycle and is amenable to genetic manipulations, making it an accessible field-based model species for genetics and epigenetics. The availability of a high-quality reference genome is vital for understanding pennycress physiology and for clarifying its evolutionary history within the Brassicaceae. Here, we present a chromosome-level genome assembly of var. MN106-Ref with improved gene annotation and use it to investigate gene structure differences between two accessions (MN108 and Spring32-10) that are highly amenable to genetic transformation. We describe non-coding RNAs, pseudogenes and transposable elements, and highlight tissue-specific expression and methylation patterns. Resequencing of forty wild accessions provided insights into genome-wide genetic variation, and QTL regions were identified for a seedling colour phenotype. Altogether, these data will serve as a tool for pennycress improvement in general and for translational research across the Brassicaceae. ; This material is based upon work that is supported by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (J.A., K.F., R.C.) and by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under award numbers 2018-67009-27374 (J.A., R.C., K.F.), and 2019-67009-29004 (M.D.M, J.S.) and the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Competitive Grant No. 2019-69012-29851 (M.D.M, R.C., J.S.). This research was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Genomics Science Program grant no. DE-SC0021286 (M.D.M, R.C.). This work was further funded by the Austrian Academy of Sciences (C.B., I.R.A., K.J., D.R.C.); the Max Planck Society (D.W., A.C.G., P.C.B., C.L.); the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme by the European ...