Genomic saturation mutagenesis and polygenic analysis identify novel yeast genes affecting ethyl acetate production, a non-selectable polygenic trait

March 18, 2016

Isolation of mutants in populations of microorganisms has been a valuable tool in experimental genetics for decades. The main disadvantage, however, is the inability of isolating mutants in non-selectable polygenic traits. Our study shows that genomic saturation mutagenesis combined with complex trait polygenic analysis could be used successfully to identify causative alleles underlying many non-selectable, polygenic traits in small collections of haploid strains with multiple induced mutations.