Koichiro Tsunewaki
Kyoto University
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Primary Section: 62, Plant, Soil, and Microbial Sciences Membership Type:
International Member
(elected 1996)
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Research Interests
I am a wheat geneticist having special interest in its evolution and breeding. Using various Triticum (wheat) and Aegilops species, I have been conducting the following three related investigations. The first is comparative gene analysis. About forty new genes of wheat-controlling histones, glaucousness, hybrid weakness, and fertility restoration against male-sterile cytoplasms were first identified. From their distribution in different taxonomic as well as geographical populations of wheat and its relatives, the genotypes of the putative parents, birth place, and phylogenetic differentiation of polyploid wheats were elucidated. The second is plasmon analysis. Plasmons of all Triticum and Aegilops species were transferred into twelve wheat genotypes and their genetic effects on various wheat characters were investigated. Also, chloroplast and mitochondrial DNAs of these plasmons were compared mainly by RFLP analysis. From these results, plasmons of all the species were classified into 22 types, their phylogenetic relationship was established, and the maternal lineages of most polyploid species were clarified. Through these works, new male sterility-fertility restoration systems for hybrid wheat and an efficient system for haploid production were developed. The final is nuclear DNA analysis. A large number of wheat genomic clones revealing RFLP among wheat cultivars were obtained, and linkage maps of the RFLP loci were constructed. Using these clones as probes, phylogenetic relationships between wheat species were studied.
