Transcriptome Analyses to Reveal Genes Involved in Terpene Biosynthesis in Resin Producing Pine Tree Pinus kesiya var. langbianensis

Abstract

Pinus kesiya var. langbianensis is an important resin resource tree that belongs to the Pinaceae family. It produces a higher yield of resin per year compared to the rest of the pine trees from the same habitat. To identify genes that may be involved in this high resin yield production, the bark transcriptomes of P. kesiya var. langbianensis and a P. kesiya that produce a normal volume of resin were sequenced using RNA-Seq, and their gene expression profiles were compared in regards to specific interest in the resin synthetic metabolism pathways. The results showed that a total of 68,881 transcripts were assembled, 180 of which were involved in terpene metabolism. Surprisingly, in both the transcriptome analysis and the quantitative fluorescent polymerase chain reaction (QF-PCR), nine genes involved in resin biosynthesis were shown to be significantly down-regulated in P. kesiya. In addition, this study provided numerous gene candidates for the further study of resin production in pine trees.