Functional Genomics of Cucurbit Species
A special issue of Plants (ISSN 2223-7747). This special issue belongs to the section "Plant Genetics, Genomics and Biotechnology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2026
Special Issue Editors
Interests: cucurbit genetics and genomics; disease resistance; fruit development; plant transformation; biotechnology; biosafety
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The Cucurbitaceae family contains highly nutritious and morphologically diverse crops such as watermelon, melons, cucumber, squashes, pumpkins, and gourds, which are used for fruits, seeds, medicinal, and ornamental purposes. Recent years have seen dramatic advances in the development and application of genomic tools for cucurbit species, including genome assemblies and annotations; the construction of pan-genomes; the development of high-throughput genotyping tools such as SNP, tilling, and mutant platforms; the genomic analyses of germplasm collections; the identification of SNPs and structural variants; the use of bioinformatic tools such as genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and genomic prediction; fine genetic mapping, and molecular marker-assisted selection (MAS); and the development of new transformation and gene editing methods. These tools provide us with the opportunity to determine the genetics behind important production, quality, and developmental traits; facilitate more efficient plant breeding; explore fundamental biological questions; and functionally validate candidate genes. This Special Issue seeks to highlight the progress being made in cucurbit genomics. We invite the submission of original research and review articles dealing with any aspect of the development and/or application of functional genomic tools for cucurbit species.
Prof. Dr. Rebecca Grumet
Dr. Feishi Luan
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Plants is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- genome assembly
- pan-genomes
- SNPs
- INDELs
- genome-assisted breeding
- MAGIC populations
- GWAS
- MAS
- genomic prediction
- transformation
- gene editing
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