Background Lines
Description
The commonly used background lines Landsberg, Columbia, and Wassilewskija can be ordered from the Stock Centre. An explanation is given below detailing the different accessions of each ecotype followed by a table allowing you to order them.
Note regarding single seed and bulk varieties of certain lines
Several lines are available as either single seed descent or bulk lines (as for the AIS ecotypes). The difference is in the way they were sown and bulked when originally received by the Stock Centre.
The bulk lines are generated by sowing a large number of the original seeds donated and collecting the 'mixed' population in order to maintain variation.
We also harvest one 'founder' plant individually, plant some of this seed and let it self to generate enough seed for distribution purposes. This single seed line represents a genetically uniform line that is representative of one genotype from the original collected population.
Many of these single seed lines were isolated and bulked separately by both stock centres. Therefore there is a single seed descent - NASC, and single seed descent - ABRC. For this reason single seed descent lines have different stock numbers at the two stock centres.
Landsberg
George Redei originally received a stock of seed from Laibach with the name Landsberg, on which he performed some X-ray mutagenesis experiments. During these experiments it became clear that the original Landsberg sample was not homogeneous but a mixture of slightly different types.
The Landsberg erecta line was selected from the population of Landsberg seed that had been irradiated. It was called Landsberg erecta by Will Feenstra and was the background line for all the mutants that have subsequently been produced by Feenstra, Van der Veen and Koornneef at Wageningen University. Therefore the true breeding line Landsberg erecta is not the same as the Landsberg ecotype in the AIS Collection (N1298). For this reason the Landsberg erecta line should be considered a separate background Ler-0 (NW20) instead of La-0. La-0 referring to the AIS Landsberg (N1298).
Columbia
Columbia is the ecotype that is being sequenced in the Arabidopsis Genome Initiative. There are several Columbia accessions, 0 through 7, all genetically very similar. In many cases, when we have not been able to unambiguously allocate a parental accession to the progenitor for a population, we allocate a new stock name in the form Col-n.
The original Columbia ecotype was selected by Redei from the nonirradiated Laibach Landsberg population (isolate 5-13) as it was a particularly fertile and vigorous plant that responded well to changes in photoperiod. This is Col-1 (N3176). Col-0 (N1092) is a direct descendant of Col-1 donated via AIS. Col-0 single-seed (N1093) is a direct descendant of Col-0 propagated through a single seed descent at NASC. Col-0 single-seed (N6673) is a direct descendant of Col-0 but propagated through a single seed descent at ABRC. Details of Col-2 to Col-7 are discussed in the table below.
Col 24
C24 (N906); has also been referred to in the literature as Columbia. This is however clearly an independent ecotype based on a variety of data. Phenotypic evidence can be seen in an analysis of flowering time alleles in C24 vs Col vs Ler. SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) have also been recorded between various ecotypes including C24 vs Col-0. Please see: Törjék, O. et al. 2003. Establishment of a high-efficiency SNP-based framework marker set for Arabidopsis. The Plant Journal 36(1):122.
Wassilewskija
The Du Pont RI Lines were derived from the F2 plants of the cross between Wassilewskija (N2223) and W100F (N2224).
Feldmann
All of the Feldmann transformed T-DNA lines are in the Wassilewskija background. Note that the Ws accession utilised for these experiments was maintained for a number of generations in U.S. laboratories, and a stock of this line has been made available through the stock centres Ws-2 (N1601 - NASC, CS2360 - ABRC).
Summary of Background Lines
| Name | Description | Stock Number | |
| Landsberg | |||
| La-0 | Original Landsberg ecotype in AIS Collection | N1298 | |
| Ler-0 | Line defined as erecta by Will Feenstra. Background line for all mutants produced by Feenstra, Van der Veen and Koornneef at Wageningen University | NW20 | |
| Ler-1 | Donated by Eric Holub. | N1642 - bulk line | |
| N1686 - single seed line | |||
| Ler (Koornneef) | Parental line for Koornneef RI lines | N8581 | |
| Columbia | |||
| Col-0 | Direct descendant of Col-1 donated via AIS. | N1092 - bulk line | |
| N1093 - single seed line (NASC) | |||
| N6673 - single seed line (ABRC) | |||
| Col-1 | The original AIS donation of Columbia (isolate 5-13) from George Redei | N3176 | |
| Col-2 | A line that has been single seed selected from Col-1 and propagated through 5 generations of single seed descent by Shauna Somerville. | N907 | |
| Col-3 | The line that Elliot Meyerowitz used for the RFLP mapping data and has shown polymorphisms in the hands of Chris Somerville to Col-2. It is also one of the female parents used by Jim Beynon, Eric Holub and Ian Crute for the generation of their RI population (the other being glabrous Col-5). | N908 | |
| Col-4 | The line used as the parental for the recombinant inbred population of Caroline Dean. | N933 | |
| Col-5 | The glabrous (gl1-1) Columbia line used by Jim Beynon, Eric Holub and Ian Crute as one of the female parents (the other being Col-3) for the generation of their RI population. | N1688 | |
| Col-6 | Glabrous (gl1) background line used by Thomas Jack to generate T-DNA stocks. | N8155 | |
| Col-7 | Line used by Weigel to generate activation tagged T-DNA lines. | N3731 | |
| Col-8 | Columbia ecotype (N60000), background line used by J. Alonso, W. Crosby and J. Ecker to generate Salk T-DNA stocks; shown to be genetically equivalent to the Redei Columbia and to TAMU and IGF BACs. | N60000 | |
| Wassilewskija | |||
| Wassilewskija | AIS collection line - Kranz | N915 | |
| Ws-0 | Line donated by Hulsbruch to the AIS ecotypes collection | N1602 - bulk line | |
| N1603 - single seed line | |||
| Ws-1 | Parental line for Du Pont RI Lines | N2223 | |
| Ws-2 | Parental line for Feldmann T-DNA tagged lines | N1601 | |
| Ws-3 | Donated by Eric Holub | N1638 - bulk line |
|
| N1682 - single seed line | |||
| Ws-4 | Parental line for INRA-Versailles lines | N5390 | |