Transcriptome Profiling of Elaeis guineensis Jacq. Under Heat Stress Condition

Abstract

<p class='IJASEITAbtract'>Global warming is predicted to have a generally negative effect on agriculture activity. High temperatures stress could affect plant growth negatively. Developing plants with improved thermal tolerance using molecular genetic approaches could mitigate these heat stress effects. Elite palms with better adaptation to heat can be selected from germplasm using molecular markers. Transcriptome profiling by RNA sequencing is a way to find molecular markers of a particular trait. The objective of the study was to obtain differential expressed genes (DEGs) related to the heat stress effect. RNA sequencing results were displayed using heat maps which were useful for visualizing the expression of genes across the high-temperature treatment and control samples. In total, where 1,087 genes were identified involved in oil palm heat stress. Sixty-four (64) of them were differentially expressed, consisted of seventeen (17) up-regulated and forty-seven (47) down-regulated. The uni-gene was summarized in Gene Ontology (GO) categories, namely: biological process, molecular function, and cellular component, subsequently divided into 53 sub-categories. The single organism process, biosynthetic process, response to stimulus, oxidation-reduction process, and response stress were the five primary sub-categories. Sixty-four genes related to heat stress were found, and eight (12.5%) of them were determined as heat shock protein (HSP) family. The highest transcription level was the uncharacterized gene, a member of the heat response sub-category, and the others up-regulated gene consisted of HSP family gene, Bcl-2-associated athanogene (BAG) family and HIPP gene, slr0575 gene, CML14 gene, and PARP gene.