Project description:Fruit length is a key domestication trait that affects crop yield and appearance quality. Cucumber fruits vary from 5~60 cm in length. Despite multiple fruit length QTLs have been identified, the underlying genes and regulatory mechanisms are poorly understood. Map-based cloning identified a nonsynonymous SNP (G to A) in CRABS CLAW (CsCRC) confers the major effect fruit length QTL FS5.2. CsCRCA is a rare allele only exist in Xishuangbanna cucumber with round fruits. Construction of near-isogenic line (NIL) of CsCRCA led to 34~39% reduction in fruit length. Introduction of CsCRCG into the NIL rescued the short-fruit phenotype, and knockdown of CsCRCG resulted in reduced fruit length and decreased cell size. RNA-seq results showed that an auxin responsive protein CsARP1 expressed decreased in CsCRC-RNAi lines. Further, an auxin responsive protein Further, CsARP1 is the downstream target gene of CsCRCG, instead of CsCRCA. Knockout of CsARP1 produced decreased fruit length with smaller cells. Hence, our work suggested that CsCRCG positively regulates fruit elongation through transcriptional activation of CsARP1 and thus enhanced cell expansion. Utilization of CsCRC alleles provides a new strategy to manipulate fruit length in cucumber breeding.
Project description:Transcriptome analysis of Eggplant cv. PPL during fruit development at 0, 5, 10, 20 and 50 dpa. Eggplant is third most important solanaceae crop species after potato and tomato. It is a versatile crop adapted to different agro-climatic regions and can be grown throughout the year. Unripe eggplant fruit is consumed as cooked vegetable in various ways. It is low in calories and fats, contains mostly water, some protein, fibre and carbohydrates. To decipher molecular mechanisms involved in fruit development eggplant fruit were collected at 0, 5, 10, 20 and 50 dpa and gene expression profiles were analyzed using Affymetrix tomato GeneChip Genome array.
Project description:Background: Honey bee is a major insect used for pollination of a number of commercial crops worldwide. However, the number of managed honey bee colonies has recently declined in several countries, and a number of possible causes are proposed. Although the use of honey bees for pollination can be considered as disruption of the habitat, its effects on honey bees' physiology have never been addressed. In Japan, more than 100 thousands colonies are annually used for pollination, and intriguingly 80% of them are used in greenhouses. Recently, honey bee colonies have often collapsed when they are introduced into greenhouses. Thus, to suppress colony collapses and maintain the number of worker bees in the colonies are essential for successful long-term pollination in greenhouses and recycling honey bee colonies.
Project description:The mite Varroa destructor is currently the greatest threat to apiculture as it is causing a global decrease in honey bee colonies. However, it rarely causes serious damage to its native hosts, the eastern honey bees Apis cerana. To better understand the mechanism of resistance of A. cerana against the V. destructor mite, we profiled the metabolic changes that occur in the honey bee brain during V. destructor infestation. Brain samples were collected from infested and control honey bees and then measured using an untargeted liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS)-based global metabolomics method, in which 7918 and 7462 ions in ESI+ and ESI- mode, respectively, were successfully identified. Multivariate statistical analyses were applied, and 64 dysregulated metabolites, including fatty acids, amino acids, carboxylic acid, and phospholipids, amongst others, were identified. Pathway analysis further revealed that linoleic acid metabolism; propanoate metabolism; and glycine, serine, and threonine metabolism were acutely perturbed. The data obtained in this study offer insight into the defense mechanisms of A. cerana against V. destructor mites and provide a better method for understanding the synergistic effects of parasitism on honey bee colonies.
Project description:Our molecular understanding of honey bee cellular stress responses is incomplete. Previously, we sought to identify and began functional characterization of the components of the UPR in honey bees. We observed that UPR stimulation resulted in induction of target genes upon and IRE1 pathway activation, as assessed by splicing of Xbp1 mRNA. However, were not able to determine the relative role of the various UPR pathways in gene activation. Our understanding of honey bee signal transduction and transcriptional regulation has been hampered by a lack of tools. After using RNAseq to expand the known UPR targets in the bee, we use the Drosophila melanogaster S2 cell line and honey bee trans and cis elements to investigate the role of the IRE-1 pathway in the transcriptional activation of one of these targets, the honey bee Hsc70-3 gene. Using a luciferase reporter, we show that honey bee hsc70 promoter activity is inducible by UPR activation. In addition, we show that this activation is IRE1-dependent and relies on specific cis regulatory elements. Experiments using exogenous honey bee or fruit fly XBP1S proteins demonstrate that both factors can activate the Hsc70-3 promoter and further support a role for the IRE-1 pathway in control of its expression in the honey bee. By providing foundational knowledge about the UPR in the honey bee and demonstrating the usefulness of a heterologous cell line for molecular characterization of honey bee pathways, this work stands to improve our understanding of this critical species.
Project description:Background: Honey bee is a major insect used for pollination of a number of commercial crops worldwide. However, the number of managed honey bee colonies has recently declined in several countries, and a number of possible causes are proposed. Although the use of honey bees for pollination can be considered as disruption of the habitat, its effects on honey bees' physiology have never been addressed. In Japan, more than 100 thousands colonies are annually used for pollination, and intriguingly 80% of them are used in greenhouses. Recently, honey bee colonies have often collapsed when they are introduced into greenhouses. Thus, to suppress colony collapses and maintain the number of worker bees in the colonies are essential for successful long-term pollination in greenhouses and recycling honey bee colonies. Honey bee hives were installed into strawberry and eggplant greenhouses, and then the gene expression profiles of the honey bees were examined at the different time periods. Total 16 samples with two replicates were analyzed.
Project description:The impact of yield on fruit and wine quality has been studied extensively; vine response to increased yield is well known, but responsible mechanisms – including the regulation of pathways responsible for color, aroma and mouthfeel – have not been characterized at the level of genetic regulation. To examine the impact of crop load on transcriptomic and metabolomic changes during grape berry maturation vines from two cluster thinning treatments (50% or 75% of clusters removed following fruit set) were compared to control vines (no cluster thinning). Treatments were applied to mature Pinot noir grapevines over three consecutive vintages. Agronomic parameters, including yield per vine and the yield to pruning weight ratio, as well as fruit and wine composition, were determined at harvest. Fruit transcriptomic and metabolomic changes were measured in berry samples collected from each treatment at 7 to 10 day intervals from fruit set to harvest. The patterns of berry development by weight, sugar accumulation, and malic acid degradation indicated that vines responded differentially to crop load reduction by accelerating berry maturation progress. RNA-Seq analysis, and untargeted GC-MS and UHPLC-QTOF-MS -based metabolomic approaches were used. The indication of the acceleration of maturation transcriptional programs and of metabolite accumulation in the treated vines was suggested by multivariate analyses. To identify the transcriptional key triggers of this response we applied a two-regression step statistical approach which identified genes modulated over development dependent on the crop load. Comparing vintages we were able to estimate the environmental influence on the crop load treatments among years. The application of this multifaceted approach allowed the construction of robust models describing the impact of crop load on the genetic regulation of grape maturation.
Project description:The impact of yield on fruit and wine quality has been studied extensively; vine response to increased yield is well known, but responsible mechanisms – including the regulation of pathways responsible for color, aroma and mouthfeel – have not been characterized at the level of genetic regulation. To examine the impact of crop load on transcriptomic and metabolomic changes during grape berry maturation vines from two cluster thinning treatments (50% or 75% of clusters removed following fruit set) were compared to control vines (no cluster thinning). Treatments were applied to mature Cabernet Sauvignon grapevines over three consecutive vintages. Agronomic parameters, including yield per vine and the yield to pruning weight ratio, as well as fruit and wine composition, were determined at harvest. Fruit transcriptomic and metabolomic changes were measured in berry samples collected from each treatment at 7 to 10 day intervals from fruit set to harvest. The patterns of berry development by weight, sugar accumulation, and malic acid degradation indicated that vines responded differentially to crop load reduction by accelerating berry maturation progress. RNA-Seq analysis, and untargeted GC-MS and UHPLC-QTOF-MS -based metabolomic approaches were used. The indication of the acceleration of maturation transcriptional programs and of metabolite accumulation in the treated vines was suggested by multivariate analyses. To identify the transcriptional key triggers of this response we applied a two-regression step statistical approach which identified genes modulated over development dependent on the crop load. Comparing vintages we were able to estimate the environmental influence on the crop load treatments among years. The application of this multifaceted approach allowed the construction of robust models describing the impact of crop load on the genetic regulation of grape maturation.
Project description:Plants represent the nutritional basis of virtually all life on earth and protein-rich foods from crop plants are a global megatrend essential for sustaining an increasing human population and counteracting climate change. While the genomes of crops are increasingly elucidated, little is known about crop proteomes – the entirety of proteins that execute and control nearly every aspect of life. To address this shortcoming we optimized a protocol for mapping the proteome of different crops such as Solanum lycopersicum (tomato) fruit and included four technical replicates and three biological replicates from different tomato plants to demonstrate the robustness of the workflow.