History of chloroplast genomics.
The presence of chloroplast DNA was established in 1963. With the development of recombinant DNA technologies, chloroplast DNA was selected as one of the first candidates for genome sequencing. The first physical map was reported for maize chloroplasts in 1976. As tobacco has been popular as an experimental system, tobacco chloroplast DNA has been extensively analyzed and the complete nucleotide sequence was established in 1986. This sequencing and the availability of tobacco chloroplast transformation techniques and of in vitro expression systems have formed the basis of an ongoing functional genomics program.
Sugiura
Masahiro
M
Graduate School of Natural Sciences, Nagoya City University, Yamanohata, Mizuho, Nagoya, 467-8501, Japan, sugiura@nsc.nagoya-cu.ac.jp.