Genome Sequencing Initiative

The genus Prunus encompasses many economically important stone fruit species. Peach is considered one of the best genetically characterized species in the Rosaceae, and it has distinct advantages that make it suitable as a model genome species for Prunus as well as for other species in the Rosaceae. In this context, an international consortium of scientists, The International Peach Genome Initiative (IPGI) has recently completed a first high quality draft sequence of the peach genome. The draft assembly (Peach V1.0) consists of an 8.5-fold coverage derived from whole genome shotgun Sanger sequences of the doubled haploid 'Lovell'. The assembly is arranged in 202 scaffolds larger than 1Kb, equalling approximately 227 Mbp rather than the 280-300 Mbp that was previously predicted. Eight pseudomolecules, named according to their corresponding linkage groups, comprising 99,3% of the peach genome were aligned using a network of Prunus linkage maps. Automated gene prediction and annotation produced 27,851 genes, 838 of which show alternative splicing giving a total of 28,689 predicted protein-coding genes. Studies were undertaken worldwide to investigate the genetic diversity within the species through the resequencing of different Prunus accessions. Millions of genetic markers, as SNPs and indels, were discovered allowing the development of high density SNP genotyping assays in peach and cherry.