Abstract
BackgroundChrysanthemum is one of the most important ornamental crops in the world and drought stress seriously limits its production and distribution. In order to generate a functional genomics resource and obtain a deeper understanding of the molecular mechanisms regarding chrysanthemum responses to dehydration stress, we performed large-scale transcriptome sequencing of chrysanthemum plants under dehydration stress using the Illumina sequencing technology.ResultsTwo cDNA libraries constructed from mRNAs of control and dehydration-treated seedlings were sequenced by Illumina technology. A total of more than 100 million reads were generated and de novo assembled into 98,180 unique transcripts which were further extensively annotated by comparing their sequencing to different protein databases. Biochemical pathways were predicted from these transcript sequences. Furthermore, we performed gene expression profiling analysis upon dehydration treatment in chrysanthemum and identified 8,558 dehydration-responsive unique transcripts, including 307 transcription factors and 229 protein kinases and many well-known stress responsive genes. Gene ontology (GO) term enrichment and biochemical pathway analyses showed that dehydration stress caused changes in hormone response, secondary and amino acid metabolism, and light and photoperiod response. These findings suggest that drought tolerance of chrysanthemum plants may be related to the regulation of hormone biosynthesis and signaling, reduction of oxidative damage, stabilization of cell proteins and structures, and maintenance of energy and carbon supply.ConclusionsOur transcriptome sequences can provide a valuable resource for chrysanthemum breeding and research and novel insights into chrysanthemum responses to dehydration stress and offer candidate genes or markers that can be used to guide future studies attempting to breed drought tolerant chrysanthemum cultivars.
Highlights
Chrysanthemum is one of the most important ornamental crops in the world and drought stress seriously limits its production and distribution
These results indicated that almost all plant hormones were involved in chrysanthemum response to the dehydration stress, and the hormones might play different roles in chrysanthemum compared to other plant species, and the crosstalk among different hormones existed in chrysanthemum in response to dehydration
A total of more than 100 million reads were generated and de novo assembled into 98,180 unique transcripts which were further extensively annotated by comparing their sequences to different protein databases
Summary
Chrysanthemum is one of the most important ornamental crops in the world and drought stress seriously limits its production and distribution. Drought stress is one of the major factors limiting chrysanthemum production. The second group mainly includes transcription factors, protein kinases, and enzymes involved in the phosphoinositide metabolism [5]. Compared with the functional proteins, the transcription factors always act at the upstream position of the signal transduction and gene regulatory network, controlling a broad range of downstream genes; which makes them efficient in tolerating abiotic stress. The protein kinases, including calmodulin dependent protein kinases (CDPKs), mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs), receptor protein kinases (RPKs), and ribosomal protein kinases, are involved in the signal cascade amplification in response to different stress factors [8]
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