Sequencing 620 rice genomes for genome-wide association studies

The cultivated rice, Oryza Sativa, is a model plant with a map-based genome sequence, and also an important crop species feeding half of humanity. Understanding the genomic basis of thousands of diverse rice germplasm would afford a powerful platform for genetic mapping to resolve complex traits, and greatly help the genomics-assisted breeding for crop improvement. we sequenced hundreds of rice genomes by sequencing-by-synthesis (SBS) technology with a low-coverage strategy. An high-density and high-quality rice haplotype map was generated, and the GWAS were performed for the first time in rice.