The National Science Foundation has awarded $6.5 million to Cornell University researchers to sequence the tomato genome, improve genetic manipulation of maize to learn how to make crops more aluminum tolerant and to develop and use innovative computational algorithms for the simulation of turbulent combustion.

Specifically, $4.2 million over two years has been awarded to the research consortium directed by Steven D. Tanksley, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Plant Breeding, to sequence all 12 tomato chromosomes. Stephen Pope, the Sibley College Professor of Mechanical Engineering, and his research group have been awarded almost $1.4 million to develop computer algorithms to improve the ability to simulate combustion processes and, thereby, improve the design of combustion devices. In addition, a research group directed by Leon Kochian, an adjunct professor of plant biology and the director of the U.S. Plant, Soil and Nutrition Laboratory at Cornell, has been awarded $933,000 over five years to generate better molecular and genomic resources to improve aluminum tolerance and crop performance in acid soils.

Tanksley's map of the tomato (Solanum lycopersicon) genome not only will help scientists better understand the structure and organization of the tomato genome but also will promote the understanding of the genomes of related plants, including potatoes, peppers, eggplant, coffee and tobacco.

The tomato genome contains about 950 million base pairs of DNA, with more than 75 percent of it densely packed and largely without genes, Tanksley explains. "The majority of genes are found in long contiguous stretches of gene-rich DNA located on the distal portions of each chromosome arm," he says. "In this project, we will contribute to the sequencing of the gene-rich regions of all 12 tomato chromosomes."

Pope's project combines highly complex and nonlinear combustion chemistry with the multiscale and stochastic aspects of turbulence. He will combine several advanced methodologies that take into account both the chemical complexities of hydrocarbon fuels and the chaotic nature of turbulent flows with the goal of achieving accurate and
efficient simulations of turbulent combustion. Fuel is burned through the complex process of turbulent combustion in automobile and aircraft engines and, therefore, is of tremendous significance to society and several major industries, Pope notes. "Despite great current interest in fuel cells and the possible re-emergence of nuclear power, the reality is that combustion technologies will remain dominant for many decades," says Pope. His group will develop the new algorithms and computer simulations using large-scale parallel computing at the Cornell Theory Center; the goal is to improve designs, increase combustion efficiencies and decrease emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases.

Kochian will focus on ways to improve aluminum tolerance in plants, since aluminum toxicity reduces yields of crops by up to 50 percent on potentially arable lands around the world, especially in South America, Asia and Africa, where maize is a staple crop and acid soils are common.

"Breeding for aluminum tolerance and agronomic practices aimed at reducing soil acidity have historically been productive ways to improve crop production," Kochian explains. "However, it is widely recognized that further enhancements of crops' tolerance to aluminum will depend on identifying aluminum tolerance genes and the
underlying mechanisms in order to facilitate improvement via biotechnology."

Thus, his project seeks to identify and characterize aluminum tolerance genes and their associated mechanisms in maize, which is one of the most important crops grown on acid soils. The information he gleans will be added to various publicly available databases and should prove useful to both traditional and biotechnological crop improvement strategies. The grant also will support a summer internship program for minority undergraduates at the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research at Cornell.

Related World Wide Web sites: The following sites provide additional information on this news release. Some might not be part of the Cornell University community, and Cornell has no control over their content or availability.

o Steven Tanksley: <http://www.plbr.cornell.edu/PBBweb/Tanksley.html>

Abstract of new tomato genome project:
<http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0421634>

o Stephen Pope: <http://eccentric.mae.cornell.edu/~pope/>

Abstract of the project to improve the design of combustion devices:
<http://www-livecds.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0426787>

o Leon Kochian: <http://www.plantbio.cornell.edu/people.php?netID=lvk1>

Abstract of maize genome project:
<http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0419435>