title: [Research progress in forest tree genetic linkage map construction and its future prospects].
abstract: The research progress in genetic linkage map construction of forest tree species both at home and abroad were reviewed in the paper. Two main problems involved in the field were discussed. One was the limitation of the number of individuals of mapping populations and the other was the random markers mostly employed by the majority of studies. These problems have resulted in crossing combination specificity in the constructed maps and the QTLs located on the basis of the maps. As a result,the QTLs discovered up to now have low credibility and poor practicability in marker-assisted selection. Therefore considering the biological characteristics of forest tree species,the selection of the most suitable genetic markers is crucial to obtain a high quality genetic linkage map, and it is both important and necessary to carry out comparative genetic mapping. Progress in the ongoing expressed sequence tag (EST) sequencing projects were summarized and EST polymorphism (ESTP), the most informative and highly conservative marker with known function,as well as the main ESTP detection techniques were elaborated. It was pointed out that ESTP markers should be integrated into the present studies of genetic linkage map construction, QTL mapping and genome comparative mapping. Finally the future prospects in the fields of genetic linkage map and QTL mapping were discussed. In China, such studies around Populus, especially in the local Populus species should make a breakthrough in the related fields.
authors.affiliation: College of Biological Sciences and Technology, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China. wansong@bjfu.edu.cn
authors.forename: Wan
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Xiao-Yang
authors.initials: XY
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Jiu-Ru
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Zhi-Yi
authors.initials: ZY
authors.lastname: Zhang