Fiber Evolution

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Overview

In this project we are integrating four disciplines (development, morphology, systematics, and evolutionary biology) to study fiber evolution in a well-developed model system from the cotton genus (Gossypium). Cotton is not only the world’s most important fiber plant and a mainstay of the US economy, it has become a model for developmental and evolutionary studies. Few cells in the plant kingdom are as exaggerated in their size or composition as cotton fibers and some of these, single-celled seed trichomes, may reach lengths of over 6 cm (Kim and Triplett 2001). There is nothing in nature that resembles the long, strong, and fine fibers of modern cotton cultivars. These have been wrought via a long history of both natural and human-mediated selection from ancestors whose seeds bore much shorter, coarser and tightly adherent or non-spinnable lint Brubaker et al. 1999a; Wendel 1995; Wendel and Cronn 2002). Using a phylogenetically informed approach, we will dissect this evolutionary history and in the process discover the steps involved in transforming primitive trichomes to the economically important fibers of modern cotton cultivars.