Optimization of Tobacco Rattle Virus (TRV)-Based Virus-Induced Gene Silencing (VIGS) in Tomato.

Unveiling of full genome sequence of tomato demands significant advances of tomato functional genomics. Virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) is a well explored functional genomics tool in plant biology that exploits post transcriptional gene silencing to downregulate a desired gene. Although VIGS provides an easy and highly efficient platform to study plant gene function through reverse genetics approach, currently VIGS is more efficient in model plants like Nicotiana benthamiana, which further justifies the urgent need of a highly efficient, reliable, and reproducible VIGS protocol in crop plants such as tomato. In this chapter, we have detailed an optimized Tobacco rattle virus (TRV)-based VIGS protocol in tomato.