Arabidopsis lyrata Genetics

Abstract

Arabidopsis lyrata is a wild predominantly outcrossing perennial relative which diverged from Arabidopsis thaliana about 6 million years ago (MYA). The two species differ at 12% of synonymous nucleotide sites. A. lyrata has become a model organism for population and ecological genetics of outcrossing species. It has been used for studies of local adaptation and herbivore resistance. The genetics and evolution of the self-incompatibility system have been studied in detail. The complex demography and consequent highly diverged population structure set limits on the use of sequence variation and association studies for functional genomics. The full genome sequence has recently become available and will significantly broaden the opportunities for molecular evolutionary and functional genomic studies.