Investigating the role of short RNAs on wood formation, cambium development and adaptation of poplar tree

Short RNAs (sRNA) have been recently recognised as important gene expression regulators but little is known about their role in wood formation. This proposal is a concerted effort to use genomic tools to globally identify wood formation-associated sRNAs in the genome of model tree Populus trichocarpa (poplar). Poplar is an economically important non-food crop and we propose fundamental research orientated towards building the knowledge base for exploiting the potentials of this crop. The project will also assess the natural variation and biodiversity of poplar accessions at the sRNA level. The project will create synergies between three research teams with different expertise (biology of wood formation - short RNAs - bioinformatics) in order to help plant genomics-based technologies answer biological questions.