Abstract
Strawberry is an important fruit crop and a model for studying non-climacteric fruit ripening. Fruit ripening and senescence influence strawberry fruit quality and postharvest storability, and have been intensively studied. However, genetic and physiological differences among cultivars preclude consensus understanding of these processes. We therefore performed a meta-analysis by mapping existing transcriptome data to the newly published and improved strawberry reference genome and extracted meta-differentially expressed genes (meta-DEGs) from six cultivars to provide an expanded transcriptomic view of strawberry ripening. We identified cultivar-specific transcriptome changes in anthocyanin biosynthesis-related genes and common changes in cell wall degradation, chlorophyll degradation, and starch metabolism-related genes during ripening. We also identified 483 meta-DEGs enriched in gene ontology categories related to photosynthesis and amino acid and fatty acid biosynthesis that had not been revealed in previous studies. We conclude that meta-analysis of existing transcriptome studies can effectively address fundamental questions in plant sciences.
Highlights
Strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa Duch.) is an important and nutritious fresh fruit crop for human consumption
The two stages are visually separated from the other developmental stages and have been selected in many previous studies investigating the ripening process [29, 30]
Principal component analysis (PCA) based on their fruit transcriptome profiles at the two developmental stages, Big Green (BG) and Fully Red (FR), showed clustering of samples where PC1 and PC2 explained 36% of the variation
Summary
Strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa Duch.) is an important and nutritious fresh fruit crop for human consumption. Fruits can be divided into two types, climacteric and non-climacteric, based on their respiration and ethylene fluctuation during ripening. Climacteric fruit such as tomato have a respiratory burst and ethylene peak at the onset of ripening and have been studied intensively. Nonclimacteric fruit produce a very small amount of ethylene with no increased rate of respiration. Strawberry is used as a model for non-climacteric fruit ripening because of its commercial importance and experimental advantages [2].
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