ABSTRACT: Two rapeseed germplasms named YH25005 and R8Q10 that contain 15% to 21% α-linolenic acid (ALA) in the seed fatty acids was developed and high linolenic acid trait is a new goal to improve the nutritional quality. In order to identify the important biological pathways underpinning high/low linolenic acid trait, the transcriptome profiles of the 24-days-old embryos of YH25005 and R8Q10 was compared to that of two low linolenic acid inbred lines named A28 and SW, by using Illumina RNA-seq. We identified 6140, 8830, 9868, and 11846 differential expression genes in pairewise transcriptomic comparison of R8Q10 vs A28, YH25005 vs A28, R8Q10 vs SW, and YH5005 vs SW, respectively. It was found that some key genes related to fatty acid biosynthesis process, including LEC1, TT8, TT12, FAB1, KASII, FUS3, LEC2, FaTA, FATB, FAD7, ABI3, FAD3, KASI, SUA, Lox1 and Lox2, were significantly altered in YH25005 and R8Q10.