Resumen
- The primary solonaceous food crops are found within several genera (Solanum, Capsicum, and Physalis). The genus Solanum contains three of the four leading crops (potato, tomato, and eggplant) in the Solanaceae family, and is arguably the most economically important plant genus. Peppers (Capsicum spp.) are also one of the leading vegetable crops cultivated throughout the tropics. The centers of diversity of Solanum, Capsicum and Physalis are located in the tropics. Many local varieties and both cultivated and wild relatives are often found in close proximity to these centers. Locally important varieties from all of these genera are cultivated in diverse tropical agro-ecosystems worldwide and some have considerable promise for further development. Additional progress in ascertaining phylogenetic relationships will foster improved utilization of these genetic resources. Among the solanaceous crops, tomato and potato have emerged as “model” scientific research organisms. In 2003, tomato was the first diploid crop among the asterids to be chosen for genome sequencing. It is intended that a high quality sequence of the tomato euchromatin will serve as a reference for the Solanaceae. In addition, the Potato Genome Sequencing Consortium aims to complete the DNA sequence of the entire potato genome by 2008. High quality, annotated, genome sequence information from these two species is expected to benefit improvement of multiple solanaceous crops. Sequence and functional genomics resources are being generated for the Solanaceae through international cooperation. Tomato cDNA, genomic DNA, conserved orthologous set, and restriction fragment length polymorphism markers have been mapped to allow comparative genome analysis between eggplant, tomato, potato and pepper. Additional comparative analyses and their implications for development of two Andean Solanum species are presented.