Ensete ventricosum: A Multipurpose Crop against Hunger in Ethiopia.

Ensete ventricosum is a traditional multipurpose crop mainly used as a staple/co-staple food for over 20 million people in Ethiopia. Despite this, scientific information about the crop is scarce. Three types of food, viz., Kocho (fermented product from scraped pseudostem and grated corm), Bulla (dehydrated juice), and Amicho (boiled corm) can be prepared from enset. These products are particularly rich in carbohydrates, minerals, fibres, and phenolics, but poor in proteins. Such meals are usually served with meat and cheese to supplement proteins. As a food crop, it has useful attributes such as foods can be stored for long time, grows in wide range of environments, produces high yield per unit area, and tolerates drought. It has an irreplaceable role as a feed for animals. Enset starch is found to have higher or comparable quality to potato and maize starch and widely used as a tablet binder and disintegrant and also in pharmaceutical gelling, drug loading, and release processes. Moreover, enset shows high genetic diversity within a population which in turn renders resilience and food security against the ever-changing environmental factors and land use dynamics. Therefore, more research attention and funding should be given to magnify and make wider use of the crop.

A new Multi Locus Variable Number of Tandem Repeat Analysis Scheme for epidemiological surveillance of Xanthomonas vasicola pv. musacearum, the plant pathogen causing bacterial wilt on banana and enset.

Xanthomonas vasicola pv. musacearum (Xvm) which causes Xanthomonas wilt (XW) on banana (Musa accuminata x balbisiana) and enset (Ensete ventricosum), is closely related to the species Xanthomonas vasicola that contains the pathovars vasculorum (Xvv) and holcicola (Xvh), respectively pathogenic to sugarcane and sorghum. Xvm is considered a monomorphic bacterium whose intra-pathovar diversity remains poorly understood. With the sudden emergence of Xvm within east and central Africa coupled with the unknown origin of one of the two sublineages suggested for Xvm, attention has shifted to adapting technologies that focus on identifying the origin and distribution of the genetic diversity within this pathogen. Although microbiological and conventional molecular diagnostics have been useful in pathogen identification. Recent advances have ushered in an era of genomic epidemiology that aids in characterizing monomorphic pathogens. To unravel the origin and pathways of the recent emergence of XW in Eastern and Central Africa, there was a need for a genotyping tool adapted for molecular epidemiology. Multi-Locus Variable Number of Tandem Repeat Analysis (MLVA) is able to resolve the evolutionary patterns and invasion routes of a pathogen. In this study, we identified microsatellite loci from nine published Xvm genome sequences. Of the 36 detected microsatellite loci, 21 were selected for primer design and 19 determined to be highly typeable, specific, reproducible and polymorphic with two- to four- alleles per locus on a sub-collection. The 19 markers were multiplexed and applied to genotype 335 Xvm strains isolated from seven countries over several years. The microsatellite markers grouped the Xvm collection into three clusters; with two similar to the SNP-based sublineages 1 and 2 and a new cluster 3, revealing an unknown diversity in Ethiopia. Five of the 19 markers had alleles present in both Xvm and Xanthomonas vasicola pathovars holcicola and vasculorum, supporting the phylogenetic closeliness of these three pathovars. Thank to the public availability of the haplotypes on the MLVABank database, this highly reliable and polymorphic genotyping tool can be further used in a transnational surveillance network to monitor the spread and evolution of XW throughout Africa.. It will inform and guide management of Xvm both in banana-based and enset-based cropping systems. Due to the suitability of MLVA-19 markers for population genetic analyses, this genotyping tool will also be used in future microevolution studies.

Genome-wide analysis of repeat diversity across the family Musaceae.

BACKGROUND: The banana family (Musaceae) includes genetically a diverse group of species and their diploid and polyploid hybrids that are widely cultivated in the tropics. In spite of their socio-economic importance, the knowledge of Musaceae genomes is basically limited to draft genome assemblies of two species, Musa acuminata and M. balbisiana. Here we aimed to complement this information by analyzing repetitive genome fractions of six species selected to represent various phylogenetic groups within the family. RESULTS: Low-pass sequencing of M. acuminata, M. ornata, M. textilis, M. beccarii, M. balbisiana, and Ensete gilletii genomes was performed using a 454/Roche platform. Sequence reads were subjected to analysis of their overall intra- and inter-specific similarities and, all major repeat families were quantified using graph-based clustering. Maximus/SIRE and Angela lineages of Ty1/copia long terminal repeat (LTR) retrotransposons and the chromovirus lineage of Ty3/gypsy elements were found to make up most of highly repetitive DNA in all species (14-34.5% of the genome). However, there were quantitative differences and sequence variations detected for classified repeat families as well as for the bulk of total repetitive DNA. These differences were most pronounced between species from different taxonomic sections of the Musaceae family, whereas pairs of closely related species (M. acuminata/M. ornata and M. beccarii/M. textilis) shared similar populations of repetitive elements. CONCLUSIONS: This study provided the first insight into the composition and sequence variation of repetitive parts of Musaceae genomes. It allowed identification of repetitive sequences specific for a single species or a group of species that can be utilized as molecular markers in breeding programs and generated computational resources that will be instrumental in repeat masking and annotation in future genome assembly projects.

A multi gene sequence-based phylogeny of the Musaceae (banana) family.

BACKGROUND: The classification of the Musaceae (banana) family species and their phylogenetic inter-relationships remain controversial, in part due to limited nucleotide information to complement the morphological and physiological characters. In this work the evolutionary relationships within the Musaceae family were studied using 13 species and DNA sequences obtained from a set of 19 unlinked nuclear genes. RESULTS: The 19 gene sequences represented a sample of ~16 kb of genome sequence (~73% intronic). The sequence data were also used to obtain estimates for the divergence times of the Musaceae genera and Musa sections. Nucleotide variation within the sample confirmed the close relationship of Australimusa and Callimusa sections and showed that Eumusa and Rhodochlamys sections are not reciprocally monophyletic, which supports the previous claims for the merger between the two latter sections. Divergence time analysis supported the previous dating of the Musaceae crown age to the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary (~ 69 Mya), and the evolution of Musa to ~50 Mya. The first estimates for the divergence times of the four Musa sections were also obtained. CONCLUSIONS: The gene sequence-based phylogeny presented here provides a substantial insight into the course of speciation within the Musaceae. An understanding of the main phylogenetic relationships between banana species will help to fine-tune the taxonomy of Musaceae.

Molecular phylogeny and systematics of the banana family (Musaceae) inferred from multiple nuclear and chloroplast DNA fragments, with a special reference to the genus Musa.

Musaceae is a small paleotropical family. Three genera have been recognised within this family although the generic delimitations remain controversial. Most species of the family (around 65 species) have been placed under the genus Musa and its infrageneric classification has long been disputed. In this study, we obtained nuclear ribosomal ITS and chloroplast (atpB-rbcL, rps16, and trnL-F) DNA sequences of 36 species (42 accessions of ingroups representing three genera) together with 10 accessions of ingroups retrieved from GenBank database and 4 accessions of outgroups, to construct the phylogeny of the family, with a special reference to the infrageneric classification of the genus Musa. Our phylogenetic analyses elaborated previous results in supporting the monophyly of the family and suggested that Musella and Ensete may be congeneric or at least closely related, but refuted the previous infrageneric classification of Musa. None of the five sections of Musa previously defined based on morphology was recovered as monophyletic group in the molecular phylogeny. Two infrageneric clades were identified, which corresponded well to the basic chromosome numbers of x=11 and 10/9/7, respectively: the former clade comprises species from the sections Musa and Rhodochlamys while the latter contains sections of Callimusa, Australimusa, and Ingentimusa.

Nuclear genome size and genomic distribution of ribosomal DNA in Musa and Ensete (Musaceae): taxonomic implications.

Nuclear DNA content and genomic distributions of 5S and 45S rDNA were examined in nineteen diploid accessions of the genus Musa representing its four sections Eumusa, Rhodochlamys, Callimusa and Australimusa, and in Ensete gilletii, which was the outgroup in this study. In the Eumusa (x = 11), 2C DNA content ranged from 1.130 to 1.377 pg, M. balbisiana having the lowest DNA content of all sections. M. beccarii (x = 9), a representative of Callimusa, had the highest 2C nuclear DNA content (1.561 pg). Species belonging to Rhodochlamys (x = 11) and Australimusa (x = 10) had 2C DNA contents ranging from 1.191 to 1.299 pg and from 1.435 to 1.547 pg, respectively. E. gilletii (x = 9) had 2C DNA content of 1.210 pg. The number of 5S rDNA loci in Musa varied from 4 to 8 per diploid cell. While different numbers of 5S rDNA loci were observed within Eumusa and Rhodochlamys, four 5S rDNA loci were observed in all accessions of Australimusa. M. beccarii (Callimusa) and E. gilletii contained 5S rRNA gene clusters on five and six chromosomes, respectively. The number of 45S rDNA loci was conserved within individual sections. Hierarchical cluster analysis of genome size, number of chromosomes and 45S rDNA sites suggested a close relationship between Rhodochlamys and Eumusa; Australimusa was clearly separated as were M. beccarii and E. gilletii. Within the Eumusa-Rhodochlamys group, M. balbisiana, M. schizocarpa and M. ornata formed distinct subgroups, clearly separated from the accessions of M. acuminata, M. mannii, M. laterita and M. velutina, which formed a tight subgroup. The results expand the knowledge of genome size and genomic distribution of ribosomal DNA in Musa and Ensete. They aid in clarification of the taxonomical classification of Musa and show a need to supplement the analyses on the DNA sequence level with cytogenetic studies.