green stripes (gs) observations

[frogsleap farm]

I'm now convinced that the rich variation in striping patterns conditioned by "gs" is heavily influenced by other genetic factors. Color of the stripes (yellow vs green) for example seems to be related to gf - but there are also other striping color patterns that are harder to explain. In addition to color of stripes, there is ample variation in pattern and boldness of striping - and much of this is heritable. I'm posting one photo showing an out of the ordinary pattern of striping - but there are dozens more.

[Fred Hempel]

Not surprising -- I remember in grad school in the heyday of cloning genes. Traits were typically said to be "controlled" by a single gene (in papers written by the cloners of the all important DNA sequence).

Now, of course, the same folks who touted their "all-controlling" gene for a trait are getting funding to do genomics studies on the gene "families" that are involved with the trait, and also all of the myriad of regulators of their original gene and all of the family members as well.

As with everything else, once life was simple, and then it wasn't.

[ChrisK]

I did a cursory search but didn't find anything. Has the gs gene been cloned? Does anyone know what it is?

[Fred Hempel]

It looks to me (after a cursory google search) that gs is Tom Wagners name for a gene that is probably not mapped.

In fact, there seems to be another set of generally recognized gs genes in tomato (in the scientific literature) -- the glutamine synthetase genes.

If Tom, or someone else, published a description of the gs gene in a peer reviewed journal, the Glutamine Synthetase folks need to re-name their genes. If he did not, the gs gene for green stripes needs to be re-named.

There is no indication, on first glance, that gs has been clearly shown to be a particular DNA sequence.

[Fred Hempel]

Re-naming gs for green stripes could be as simple as calling it gr for GReen stripes, or something similar.

[frogsleap farm]

Originally Posted by Fred Hempel

It looks to me (after a cursory google search) that gs is Tom Wagners name for a gene that is probably not mapped.

In fact, there seems to be another set of generally recognized gs genes in tomato (in the scientific literature) -- the glutamine synthetase genes.

If Tom, or someone else, published a description of the gs gene in a peer reviewed journal, the Glutamine Synthetase folks need to re-name their genes. If he did not, the gs gene for green stripes needs to be re-named.

There is no indication, on first glance, that gs has been clearly shown to be a particular DNA sequence.

gs is listed on the TGRC gene list, and available in several TGRC assessions - the first iisted in 1952. TGRC also reports the gene is on the short arm of chromosome 7, but I doubt it has been cloned. Somewhere I read a report from the late 1940s or early 1950's about someone first identifying the naturally occurring mutation and reporting on its inheritance (before Tom's time).

[ChrisK]

That's all I could find as well. Could have sworn I had seen a reference to it being mapped at low resolution and some possible link to transposons.

Gene naming has been screwy for a very long time...check out the Drosophila literature some time!

[frogsleap farm]

Originally Posted by ChrisK

That's all I could find as well. Could have sworn I had seen a reference to it being mapped at low resolution and some possible link to transposons.

Gene naming has been screwy for a very long time...check out the Drosophila literature some time!

There was a recent paper suggesting linkage of gs to a transposon as a possible explanation to unexpected segregation in crosses with gs/gs lines. I think that for the tomato research community the TGRC list is the go-to source for gene names/nicknames.

[ChrisK]

See page 9.

Originally Posted by frogsleap farm

There was a recent paper suggesting linkage of gs to a transposon as a possible explanation to unexpected segregation in crosses with gs/gs lines. I think that for the tomato research community the TGRC list is the go-to source for gene names/nicknames.

[Fred Hempel]

Originally Posted by frogsleap farm

gs is listed on the TGRC gene list, and available in several TGRC assessions - the first iisted in 1952. TGRC also reports the gene is on the short arm of chromosome 7, but I doubt it has been cloned. Somewhere I read a report from the late 1940s or early 1950's about someone first identifying the naturally occurring mutation and reporting on its inheritance (before Tom's time).

The glutamine synthetase folks should rename!