Future Perspective

Abstract

Allium, an enormous genus, contains hundreds of species with significant economics, culinary, and medicinal value. Several Allium species, including onion, shallot, garlic, leek, and Japanese bunching onion are extensively consumed, but genetically remain poorly understood. Allium species are famous for their large genomes, mostly in the range of 10–20 Gbps, which have complicated the genomic studies and genetic map development. Recent growth in NGS technology is making the whole genome sequencing easier than before and the ongoing progress for completing Allium cepa genome sequencing is being expected through Sequon-Onion Genome Sequencing Project (http://www.oniongenome.net/). In addition, transcriptome analyses have been widely used in various Allium species and an open-access Allium transcriptome database (http://alliumtbd.kazusa.or.jp) has recently been released, which contains valuable transcriptome and sequence information of onion, shallot, Japanese bunching onion, and Allium roylei. Progress in Allium metabolomics is still slow in comparison with other vegetable crops. Therefore, extensive efforts are needed in this area, which can bridge the gap between phenotype and genotype. In this future perspective chapter, we have given a brief introduction to the current understandings of Allium omics as well as genetic resources, and provide perspective on future directions for research in this field.