Project description:This study investigated the specific and differential gene expression in human immature DCs (iDCs) in response to treatment with a butanol fraction containing defined bioactive phytocompounds extracted from stems and leaves of Echinacea purpurea
Project description:Phlomis plants are a source of biological active substances with potential applications in the control of phytopathogens. Phlomis purpurea (Lamiaceae) is autochthonous of southern Iberian Peninsula and Morocco and was found to be resistant to Phytophthora cinnamomi. Phlomis purpurea has revealed antagonistic effect in the rhizosphere of Quercus suber and Q. ilex against P. cinnamomi. Phlomis purpurea roots produce bioactive compounds exhibiting antitumor and anti-Phytophthora activities with potential to protect susceptible plants. Although these important capacities of P. purpurea have been demonstrated, there is no transcriptomic or genomic information available in public databases that could bring insights on the genes underlying this anti-oomycete activity.Using Illumina technology we obtained a de novo assembly of P. purpurea transcriptome and differential transcript abundance to identify putative defence related genes in challenged versus non-challenged plants. A total of 1,272,600,000 reads from 18 cDNA libraries were merged and assembled into 215,739 transcript contigs. BLASTX alignment to Nr NCBI database identified 124,386 unique annotated transcripts (57.7%) with significant hits. Functional annotation identified 83,550 out of 124,386 unique transcripts, which were mapped to 141 pathways. 39% of unigenes were assigned GO terms. Their functions cover biological processes, cellular component and molecular functions. Genes associated with response to stimuli, cellular and primary metabolic processes, catalytic and transporter functions were among those identified. Differential transcript abundance analysis using DESeq revealed significant differences among libraries depending on post-challenge times. Comparative cyto-histological studies of P. purpurea roots challenged with P. cinnamomi zoospores and controls revealed specific morphological features (exodermal strips and epi-cuticular layer), that may provide a constitutive efficient barrier against pathogen penetration. Genes involved in cutin biosynthesis and in exodermal Casparian strips formation were up-regulated.The de novo assembly of transcriptome using short reads for a non-model plant, P. purpurea, revealed many unique transcripts useful for further gene expression, biological function, genomics and functional genomics studies. The data presented suggest a combination of a constitutive resistance and an increased transcriptional response from P. purpurea when challenged with the pathogen. This knowledge opens new perspectives for the understanding of defence responses underlying pathogenic oomycete/plant interaction upon challenge with P. cinnamomi.
Project description:This study investigated the specific and differential gene expression in human immature DCs (iDCs) in response to treatment with a butanol fraction containing defined bioactive phytocompounds extracted from stems and leaves of Echinacea purpurea Experiment Overall Design: Human immature DCs (iDCs) differentiated from primary monocytes in vitro were incubated with [BF/S+L/Ep] or cichoric acid for 4 or 24 h to characterize early- or late-responsive genes. A total of nine Affymetrix HU-133A chips were hybridized to determine the transcriptome profiles in human iDCs.
Project description:To seek scientific evidence supporting therapeutic use of Echinacea, the transcriptomic effects of Echinacea purpurea extract on mouse bone marrow-derived dendritic cells (BMDCs) were analyzed using primary cultures. Affymetrix DNA microarray and bioinformatics analyses of genes differentially expressed in DCs treated with [BF/S+L/Ep] for 4 or 12 h revealed that the majority of responsive genes were related to cell adhesion or motility (Cdh10, Itga6, Cdh1, Gja1 and Mmp8), or were chemokines (Cxcl2, Cxcl7) or signaling molecules (Nrxn1, Pkce and Acss1).