Using epigenomics to discover hidden genetic control elements for crop improvement

This PhD project aims to discover and analyse genome-wide maps of candidate gene control regions using epigenome profiling. Distilling a large plant genome down to the relatively small and stable unmethylated regions (UM Rs) on the profile from a single leaf tissue can reveal the locations of potentially expressed genes or cis-regulatory elements (CREs), which some of UM Rs do not have accessible chromatin that cannot be predicted from ATAC-seq but may still have functional value for trait variation. To verify if the UM Rs predict the location of useful CREs that can be edited to create new traits, a selection of exemplar genes will be analysed.