Comparative Transcriptomic Analysis of Two Bottle Gourd Accessions Differing in Fruit Size.

Xia Chen,Shuping Huang,Jie Tan,Hongyuan Zhang,Min Zhang

doi:10.3390/genes11040359

Abstract

The bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria) is an important horticultural and medicinal crop with high nutritional value. This study aimed at examining the molecular regulation of fruit size in bottle gourd. We performed transcriptome sequencing of two bottle gourd cultivars differing in their fruit size. The average fruit length and weight of the cultivar Hang (39.48 cm/624.4 g) were higher than those of the cultivar USA (10.34 cm/152.8 g) at maturity. Transcriptome sequencing and assembly resulted in 89,347 unigenes. A total of 1250 differentially expressed genes (DEG) were found between the two cultivars, including 422 upregulated genes and 828 downregulated genes in Hang as compared to USA. Genes related to cell wall metabolism, phytohormones, cell cycle, and cell division showed significant differential expression between the two cultivars. DEGs encoding transcription factors (TF) from nine TF families were also identified. The ethylene response factor family was the most enriched among these families. Our study provides a basis for further investigations of the molecular regulation of fruit size in bottle gourd.

Highlights

The bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria, 2n = 2× = 22), a member of the Cucurbitaceae family [1], is an important horticultural and medicinal crop [2]
We performed transcriptome sequencing of two bottle gourd cultivars with varying fruit sizes (Figure 1A)
We identified four differentially expressed genes (DEG) related to xyloglucan metabolism

Summary

Introduction

The bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria, 2n = 2× = 22), a member of the Cucurbitaceae family [1], is an important horticultural and medicinal crop [2]. It originated in Africa and was independently domesticated in Africa and Asia [3]. Fruit development involves (i) fruit setting, (ii) fruit growth by cell division, and (iii) fruit growth by cell expansion until it reaches its final size and shape [8]. Rapid cell division and cell elongation occur during the growth stage and determine the final size and shape of the fruit [9]. Optimization of desired shape and size of the fruit demands extensive investigation of molecular mechanisms regulating fruit development

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