Project description:Purpose: This study was to explore the underlying molecular mechanism of temperature effects on fruit quality during shelf life. The transcriptome data of peach fruits stored in high temperature (HT, 35 °C) and common temperature (CT, 25 °C) conditions were measured and compared. Methods: Red flesh peach (Prunus persica L. Batsch cv. Tianxianhong) fruits with consistent color, shape and weight were selected and kept at 5 °C for 2 days after the day of harvest. Then, these fruits were randomly divided into two groups. One group was stored at CT for 7 days, and the other was stored at HT for 7 days. During storage, fruits were sampled at day 1, 2 and 3 as early stage as well as day 5, 6 and 7 as later stage. Total RNA of each sample was extracted and used to construct 24 RNA libraries. RNA sequencing was performed on an Illumina HiSeq 2500 platform. The differences in transcriptome, ethylene production, pulp softening of postharvest peach fruits were compared between CT and HT storage conditions Results: Our results showed that HT conditioning after 5 °C is better than CT to maintaining fruit quality during shelf life due to MEKK1-MKK2-MPK4/6 signal transduction and low level of ethylene and auxin biosynthesis enzymes which may affect genes related to softening and membrane stability through ethylene response factors (ERFs) and auxin response factors (ARFs).
Project description:We have performed a transcriptome analysis of genes at three different ripening stages of the pink-white fruits and the ripe stage of the red fruits of Chinese bayberry. This analysis provided a total of 119,701 unigenes, of which 41.43% were annotated in the Nr database. Our results showed that the formation of the pink-white color in Chinese bayberry fruits depended on the anthocyanin metabolic pathway, regulated by MYB1. Downregulated expression of key anthocyanin biosynthetic pathway genes, such as UFGT, F3’H, and ANS at the late stage of fruits development compared with DK3 fruits resulted in the failure to form red fruits. Our findings shed light on the regulatory mechanisms and metabolic processes that control color development in the fruits of Chinese bayberry.
Project description:ASR1 is a transcription factor widely present in plants that is involved in stress responses. In this work, we have silenced ASR1 in tomato fruits using an anti-sense construct and analysed the gene expression in two independent transgenic lines (AS5 and AS17) and in wild-type (WT) fruits.
Project description:Background Curculigo latifolia is a perennial plant endogenous to Southeast Asia whose fruits contain the taste-modifying protein neoculin, which binds to sweet receptors and makes sour fruits taste sweet. Although similar to snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis) agglutinin (GNA), which contains mannose-binding sites in its sequence and 3D structure, neoculin lacks such sites and has no lectin activity. Whether the fruits of C. latifolia and other Curculigo plants contain neoculin and/or GNA family members was unclear. Results Through de novo RNA-seq assembly of the fruits of C. latifolia and the related C. capitulata and detailed analysis of the expression patterns of neoculin and neoculin-like genes in both species, we assembled 85,697 transcripts from C. latifolia and 76,775 from C. capitulata using Trinity and annotated them using public databases. We identified 70,371 unigenes in C. latifolia and 63,704 in C. capitulata. In total, 38.6% of unigenes from C. latifolia and 42.6% from C. capitulata shared high similarity between the two species. We identified ten neoculin-related transcripts in C. latifolia and 15 in C. capitulata, encoding both the basic and acidic subunits of neoculin in both plants. We aligned these 25 transcripts and generated a phylogenetic tree. Many orthologs in the two species shared high similarity, despite the low number of common genes, suggesting that these genes likely existed before the two species diverged. The relative expression levels of these genes differed considerably between the two species: the transcripts per million (TPM) values of neoculin genes were 60 times higher in C. latifolia than in C. capitulata, whereas those of GNA family members were 15,000 times lower in C. latifolia than in C. capitulata. Conclusions The genetic diversity of neoculin-related genes strongly suggests that neoculin genes underwent duplication during evolution. The marked differences in their expression profiles between C. latifolia and C. capitulata may be due to mutations in regions involved in transcriptional regulation. Comprehensive analysis of the genes expressed in the fruits of these two Curculigo species helped elucidate the origin of neoculin at the molecular level.
Project description:To explore the molecular mechanism via which the galactinol synthase 2 (slgols2) affects Chl accumulation and chloroplast development, the RNA-seq experiment was conducted using slgols2 mutant and WT tomato fruits.