Figure 2. GAME9 is part of an ERF-gene cluster in the Solanaceae and is related to other alkaloid-associated regulatory genes.

(a) A major QTL involved in the synthesis of SGAs is present on potato chromosome 1. The QTL is flanked by the SSR markers STM5136 and STM2030³⁶. Using a comparative map viewer we identified the markers TG21 (ST4.03ch01:62729267..62729866) and TG59 (ST4.03ch01:71035810..71036389) and the corresponding region in tomato [markers TG21 (SL2.50ch01:78511596..78512173) and TG59 (SL2.50ch01:85194698..85195223)]. *GAME9 was found to be located in this QTL region in both potato and tomato. (b) Schematic presentation of GAME9 and GAME9-like genes in chromosomal regions of potato and tomato. In these regions, we found clusters of ERF genes spanning a ∼230 kbp region (ST4.03ch01:69392381..69626333) in potato and a region of ∼104 kbp in tomato (SL2.50ch01:83966837..84071427). (c) Phylogenetic analysis of GAME9 and other related AP2-family proteins from tomato (Sl), potato (St), tobacco (Nt), N. benthamiana (Nb), periwinkle (Cr), rice (Os), Brassica napus (Bn), and Arabidopsis (At). The evolutionary history was inferred using the neighbor-joining method in MEGA6 (ref. ⁵⁸). The percentage of replicate trees in which the associated taxa clustered together in the bootstrap test (1000 replicates) is shown next to the branches. Accession numbers can be found in Supplementary Table 8.