1000 Plants

(OneKP or 1KP)

The 1000 Plants (OneKP or 1KP) initiative was an international multi-disciplinary consortium that generated large-scale gene sequencing data for over 1000 phylodiverse species of plants. Major supporters included Alberta Ministry of Innovation and Advanced Education, Musea Ventures (Somekh Family Foundation), Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI-Shenzhen), China National GeneBank (CNGB),  iPlant Tree-of-Life (iPToL) Grand Challenge, Compute Canada (Westgrid), and Alberta Innovates Technology Futures (AITF-iCORE Strategic Chair). Sample selection was initially based on a series of overlapping subprojects with scientific objectives that could be addressed by sequencing of multiple plant species . As more collaborators joined, these objectives evolved and are now better exemplified by the papers described below. Our final/capstone analyses were published 31 Oct 2019 on the cover of Nature.

One Thousand Plant Transcriptomes Initiative. Oct 2019. One thousand plant transcriptomes and the phylogenomics of green plants. Nature 574: 679-685

Eric Carpenter, … Gane KS Wong. Oct 2019. Access to RNA-sequencing data from 1173 plant species: The 1000 Plant transcriptomes initiative (1KP). GigaScience 8: giz126

Altimetric Score for 1KP capstone


XLSX table of plant species/samples sequenced has been moved to subpage.

Table of sequenced plant samples (old link)


Here are some of the most important links to the 1KP data set and analyses.

Raw unassembled reads at the SRA

Cyverse Data Commons repository


Alternatively, for access from within China, the following might load faster.

Blast search engine hosted by CNGB

Access to 1KP data from GigaScience


Here is our list of the papers published and a subset of the media coverage.

Summary of published manuscripts


A review of the project has been published in Annual Review of Plant Biology.

Summary of the last decade for 1KP

Video summary of 1KP at Faculti.net


1KP discovered a series of light-sensitive algal channelrhodopsin proteins that are now widely used for optogenetics, a technology to activate neurons in awake behaving animals. Several of these proteins are key components of novel methods to restore vision in patients with retinitis pigmentosa.

Report of novel channelrhodopsins

Application to retinitis pigmentosa


The next step is to sequence complete genomes for 10,000 or more species.

Shifeng Cheng, ... Gane KS Wong. Mar 2018. 10KP: A phylodiverse genome sequencing plan. Gigascience 7: 1-9

Dennis Normile's coverage of 10KP