Transcriptome sequencing and de novo analysis of a cytoplasmic male sterile line and its near-isogenic restorer line in chili pepper (Capsicum annuum L.)

PLoS One. 2013 Jun 4;8(6):e65209. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0065209. Print 2013.

Abstract

Background: The use of cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) in F1 hybrid seed production of chili pepper is increasingly popular. However, the molecular mechanisms of cytoplasmic male sterility and fertility restoration remain poorly understood due to limited transcriptomic and genomic data. Therefore, we analyzed the difference between a CMS line 121A and its near-isogenic restorer line 121C in transcriptome level using next generation sequencing technology (NGS), aiming to find out critical genes and pathways associated with the male sterility.

Results: We generated approximately 53 million sequencing reads and assembled de novo, yielding 85,144 high quality unigenes with an average length of 643 bp. Among these unigenes, 27,191 were identified as putative homologs of annotated sequences in the public protein databases, 4,326 and 7,061 unigenes were found to be highly abundant in lines 121A and 121C, respectively. Many of the differentially expressed unigenes represent a set of potential candidate genes associated with the formation or abortion of pollen.

Conclusions: Our study profiled anther transcriptomes of a chili pepper CMS line and its restorer line. The results shed the lights on the occurrence and recovery of the disturbances in nuclear-mitochondrial interaction and provide clues for further investigations.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Capsicum / cytology
  • Capsicum / genetics*
  • Capsicum / physiology*
  • Cytoplasm / metabolism*
  • Flowers / physiology
  • Gene Expression Profiling*
  • Gene Ontology
  • Genomics
  • Hybridization, Genetic
  • Molecular Sequence Annotation
  • Plant Infertility / genetics*
  • Sequence Analysis, RNA*

Grants and funding

This project was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China(31171972); the National "Twelfth Five-Year" Plan for Science & Technology Support(2012BA02B02); the Beijing key laboratory of growth and developmental regulation for protected vegetable crops. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.