April 11, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire: A consortium led by Z. Jeffrey Chen of The University of Texas at Austin and Jane Grimwood and Jeremy Schmutz of the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology has made publicly available a significantly improved high-quality genome sequence of Upland cotton (Gossypium hirsutum). This sequence of the species making up greater than 90% of the world's spinnable cotton fiber builds upon previous genome sequences published in the past five years. The data is downloadable at DOE JGI Phytozome 

The annual Cotton Fiber Genomics project meeting was held in Austin. The project was funded by the National Science Foundation and focused on “Functional and Sequence Analysis of Fiber development on Tetraploid Cotton". The attendees of the meeting include:
PI: Chen Lab (David Pang, Yuki Guan, Xiaoli Shi, UT-Austin)
Co-PI: David Stelly (Shivapriya Manchali, Texas A&M)
Co-PI: Candace Haigler (North Carolina State University).
Co-PI : Brian Scheffler (USDA ARS MSA Genomics Laboratory, Stoneville, MS).

The cotton fiber genomics project funded by NSF is approved for no-cost extension until August 31, 2010. The research team plans to complete a few more large experiments and publish several papers and will submit a competitive renewal proposal in January 2010.

The project meeting of NSF cotton fiber genomics was held in Austin, Texas. The Chen lab hosted the meeting. Graduate students and postdocs from each lab gave short presentations about the progress made and discussed about their future research plans. Two close collaborators, Chris Town at TIGR and Roy Cantrell at Cotton Inc., were present at the meeting. We discussed future strategies of cotton genomics research including potential approaches to cotton genome sequencing.