Abstract
BackgroundThe industrial chicory, Cichorium intybus, is a member of the Asteraceae family that accumulates fructan of the inulin type in its root. Inulin is a low calories sweetener, a texture agent and a health promoting ingredient due to its prebiotic properties. Average inulin chain length is a critical parameter that is genotype and temperature dependent. In the context of the study of carbohydrate metabolism and to get insight into the transcriptome of chicory root and to visualize temporal changes of gene expression during the growing season, we obtained and characterized 10 cDNA libraries from chicory roots regularly sampled in field during a growing season. A leaf and a nodule libraries were also obtained for comparison.ResultsApproximately 1,000 Expressed Sequence Tags (EST) were obtained from each of twelve cDNA libraries resulting in a 12,226 EST dataset. Clustering of these ESTs returned 1,922 contigs and 4,869 singlets for a total of 6,791 putative unigenes. All ESTs were compared to public sequence databases and functionally classified. Data were specifically searched for sequences related to carbohydrate metabolism. Season wide evolution of functional classes was evaluated by comparing libraries at the level of functional categories and unigenes distribution.ConclusionThis chicory EST dataset provides a season wide outlook of the genes expressed in the root and to a minor extent in leaves and nodules. The dataset contains more than 200 sequences related to carbohydrate metabolism and 3,500 new ESTs when compared to other recently released chicory EST datasets, probably because of the season wide coverage of the root samples. We believe that these sequences will contribute to accelerate research and breeding of the industrial chicory as well as of closely related species.
Highlights
The industrial chicory, Cichorium intybus, is a member of the Asteraceae family that accumulates fructan of the inulin type in its root
Approximately 1,000 Expressed Sequence Tags (EST) were obtained from each of twelve cDNA libraries resulting in a 12,226 EST dataset
This chicory EST dataset provides a season wide outlook of the genes expressed in the root and to a minor extent in leaves and nodules
Summary
The industrial chicory, Cichorium intybus, is a member of the Asteraceae family that accumulates fructan of the inulin type in its root. While short oligofructans are used as low calories sweeteners, long inulin chains are dietary fibers used by the agro-industry as low calories fat substitute They are considered as health promoting ingredients since they selectively stimulate the growth of beneficial colonic microflora which in turn produces inulin degradation by-products that improve blood parameters [2,3], reduce pathogenic bacteria [4], increase calcium fixation and reduce the risks of developing colon cancers [5]. 1-FFT can use free fructose as acceptor, producing fructosyl only oligosaccharides of the inulose type (glucose free inulin) [7] This model of inulin biosynthesis is supported by in vitro [8] and transgenic studies [9,10] and is widely accepted by the scientific community despite occasional criticism [11]
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