Abstract
The phenomenon of pistil abortion widely occurs in Japanese apricot, and imperfect flowers with pistil abortion seriously decrease the yield in production. Although transcriptome analyses have been extensively studied in the past, a systematic study of differential gene expression has not been performed in Japanese apricot. To investigate genes related to the pistil development of Japanese apricot, high-throughput sequencing technology (Illumina) was employed to survey gene expression profiles from perfect and imperfect Japanese apricot flower buds. 3,476,249 and 3,580,677 tags were sequenced from two libraries constructed from perfect and imperfect flower buds of Japanese apricot, respectively. There were 689 significant differentially-expressed genes between the two libraries. GO annotation revealed that highly ranked genes were those implicated in small molecule metabolism, cellular component organisation or biogenesis at the cellular level and fatty acid metabolism. According to the results, we assumed that late embryogenesis abundant protein (LEA), Dicer-like 3 (DCL3) Xyloglucan endotransglucosylase/hydrolase 2 (XTH2), Pectin lyase-like superfamily protein (PPME1), Lipid transfer protein 3 (LTP3), Fatty acid biosynthesis 1 (FAB1) and Fatty acid desaturase 5 (FAD5) might have relationships with the pistil abortion in Japanese apricot. The expression patterns of 36 differentially expressed genes were confirmed by real-time (RT)-PCR. This is the first report of the Illumina RNA-seq technique being used for the analysis of differentially-expressed gene profiles related to pistil abortion that both computationally and experimentally provides valuable information for the further functional characterisation of genes associated with pistil development in woody plants.
Highlights
Japanese apricot (Prunus mume Sieb. et Zucc) belongs to the Rosaceae family of fruits and is an important economic fruit crop in China and Japan [1]
Comparative proteomic analysis has been performed for perfect and imperfect flowers and the different proteins have been analysed in both perfect and imperfect flowers for the different stages of young bud, mature bud and blossom flower; glucose metabolism, starch metabolism and photosynthesis related to pistil abortion were found [5]
Statistics of tag sequencing To identify differentially-expressed genes involved in the pistil development of flowers in Japanese apricot, we used Illumina sequencing on Digital gene expression tag profiling (DGE) from the perfect (PF) and imperfect (IF) flower buds
Summary
Japanese apricot (Prunus mume Sieb. et Zucc) belongs to the Rosaceae family of fruits and is an important economic fruit crop in China and Japan [1]. Owing to its high nutritional value, the fruit has been used in the preparation of preserved fruit and wine, but can be used as a diet ingredient [1,2]. No expression was detected in the leaves or petals, but no significant differential expression was found between perfect and imperfect flowers [4]. Morphological research indicated that during the first and second ten days of December, flower buds of the ‘Daqiandi’ cultivar did not continue to elongate, instead the pistil differentiation stagnated and gradually disintegrated, which was the key stage of pistil abortion of the ‘Daqiandi’ cultivar. The factors leading to the selective abortion of pistils may relate to catabolism of macromolecule nutrients in the flower bud [6]. The molecular mechanism involved in pistil abortion remains unknown for Japanese apricot
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
