The advent of genomics in recent years has provided us
an
unprecedented opportunity for studies of crop domestication
and breeding. With large amount of genome-wide
population
genomics data become available, large number
of selective sweeps are being identified in a high
throughput
manner. Genomic variations in both genic
and
non-genic regions were shown to be correlated with
crop
domestication and breeding improvement, with
many
underlying large effect domestication genes and
breeding
genes cloned. In the near future, selective
sweeps
will be identified with higher resolution and fewer
error
rates due to the availability of even larger amount of
genomics
data. Comparison of the potential domestica-
tion
and breeding regions of closely related crop species
will
help to identify a number of common loci that are of
special
agronomic importance. Biological functions of
genes
locating in many of these selective regions will
be
understood, although they may just account for relatively
small effect of domestication and breeding improvement.
Of particular, more examples of non-coding
functions
responsible for domestication and breeding will
be
presented in the future. In addition, the understanding
of
the contribution and mechanism of epigenetic variations
on crop domestication and breeding will be much
improved