Display of Sukkula distributions on Barley Roots via in situ hybridization

Retrotransposon are an abundant and ancient parts of the plant genomes that especially LTR retrotransposons influence the genome size and evolution. Sukkula is a non-autonomous and active, relatively high copy-number retroelement. In this study, we performed fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to observe the distributions of Sukkula elements (LTRs and internal-domain) by using labelled-PCR products. The localizations of Sukkula elements (LTRs and internal-domain) were observed under confocal microscope on Hordeum vulgare L. cv. Hasat root preparations. Our results revealed that Sukkula elements is still active and spread through the whole barley chromosomes. Additionally, the re-sequencing analysis of Sukkula LTRs demonstrated that LTRs sequences had ~65 bp gain. These analyses represent a valuable resource to reveal genome organization of barley and large sized plants.