DISSECTING COTTON FIBER DEVELOPMENT AND QUALITY DETERMINANTS AT THE SINGLE-CELL LEVEL FOR BREEDING IMPROVED FIBER QUALITY

The major goal of the project is to identify genes regulating cotton fiber development and properties in upland and Pima cotton. To achive this general goal, the following specific objectives have been set:To generate an atlas of gene expression of the seed ovule at different stages of fiber maturation in Upland and Pima cotton.To generate transcriptomic profiles of fiber development at single-cell resolution under drought and temperature stresses.To determine the developmental trajectories of cell lineages during fiber development.Construction of regulatory networks controlling the different stages of fiber development.Identification of candidate genes playing key roles in the different stages of fiber formation that determine fiber quality.