Mutagenesis and genome resequencing

The mutagenic effect of X-rays was described nearly a century ago. Since then, screening randomly mutagenized cells for phenotypes of interest has been a cornerstone of biological discovery. This forward genetics approach is particularly suited for haploid organisms like Chlamydomonas, where the phenotypic effects of loss-of-function mutations are immediately visible. In this chapter, we focus on ultraviolet, chemical, and insertional mutagenesis, since these complementary approaches have been most widely used in Chlamydomonas. Recent advances in whole genome resequencing have made the previously laborious step of mutation identification much more tractable.