Cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) : as a model tropical tuberous root crop(<Feature Articles>New model plants; reference materials for post-genome era)

Abstract

Cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) is one of the most important crops in tropical and subtropical area. The starch production in cassava tuberous roots is of importance for food security, feeding livestock and income generation for poor farmers in Asian and African countries. Cassava starch is also utilized for efficient source of foods and industrial materials such as modified starch, sweetness, paste and bioethanol. As there are many advantages and high-potential in cassava, cassava functional genomics platform has been developed by various researchers for the last decade. Our RIKEN group has established a cassava functional genomics platform, which includes full-length cDNAs, DNA microarrays, Agrobacterium-mediated transformation, database, and has advanced cassava molecular breeding through development of heavy-ion beam mutagenenized population and genetic transformation in collaboration with the Agricultural Genetics Institute (AGI, Vietnam), Mahidol University (Thailand) and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT). In this review, we summarize the present status and future perspectives of our cassava functional genomics approaches towards cassava improvement.