Joint International Research Laboratory of Metabolic & Developmental Sciences, Key Laboratory of Urban Agriculture (South) Ministry of Agriculture, Plant Biotechnology Research Center, Fudan-SJTU-Nottingham Plant Biotechnology R&D Center, School of Agriculture and Biology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
SWU-TAAHC Medicinal Plant Joint R&D Centre, School of Life Sciences, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China.
Mol Plant. 2018 Jun 4;11(6):776-788. doi: 10.1016/j.molp.2018.03.015. Epub 2018 Apr 24.
Artemisia annua, commonly known as sweet wormwood or Qinghao, is a shrub native to China and has long been used for medicinal purposes. A. annua is now cultivated globally as the only natural source of a potent anti-malarial compound, artemisinin. Here, we report a high-quality draft assembly of the 1.74-gigabase genome of A. annua, which is highly heterozygous, rich in repetitive sequences, and contains 63 226 protein-coding genes, one of the largest numbers among the sequenced plant species. We found that, as one of a few sequenced genomes in the Asteraceae, the A. annua genome contains a large number of genes specific to this large angiosperm clade. Notably, the expansion and functional diversification of genes encoding enzymes involved in terpene biosynthesis are consistent with the evolution of the artemisinin biosynthetic pathway. We further revealed by transcriptome profiling that A. annua has evolved the sophisticated transcriptional regulatory networks underlying artemisinin biosynthesis. Based on comprehensive genomic and transcriptomic analyses we generated transgenic A. annua lines producing high levels of artemisinin, which are now ready for large-scale production and thereby will help meet the challenge of increasing global demand of artemisinin.
青蒿，俗称黄花蒿或青蒿，是一种原产于中国的灌木，长期以来一直被用作药用。青蒿现已在全球范围内种植，是唯一的天然来源的强效抗疟化合物青蒿素。在这里，我们报告了一个高质量的 17.4 千兆碱基对的青蒿基因组草图组装，它具有高度的杂合性，富含重复序列，并包含 63226 个蛋白质编码基因，是已测序植物物种中数量最多的基因之一。我们发现，作为菊科中少数几个测序的基因组之一，青蒿基因组包含大量特定于这个大型被子植物分支的基因。值得注意的是，参与萜类生物合成的酶编码基因的扩张和功能多样化与青蒿素生物合成途径的进化是一致的。我们通过转录组分析进一步揭示，青蒿已经进化出了复杂的萜类生物合成相关的转录调控网络。基于我们生成的综合基因组和转录组分析，我们产生了能够产生高水平青蒿素的转基因青蒿株系，现在已经可以进行大规模生产，从而有助于应对全球对青蒿素需求不断增长的挑战。
