Foxtail millet offers clues for assembling the switchgrass genome
Monday, May 14, 2012 - 16:30
in Biology & Nature
Scientists are interested in the perennial grass switchgrass as a prospective biofuels feedstock, but the plant genome is complex. Researchers have sequenced plant genomes of related candidate bioenergy crops such as sorghum and the model grass Brachypodium but they last shared a common ancestor with switchgrass more than 20 million years ago. The genome of a much closer switchgrass relative -- foxtail millet -- has now been described.