Identification of genes differentially expressed during larval molting and metamorphosis of Helicoverpa armigera.
BACKGROUND
Larval molting and metamorphosis are important physiological processes in the life cycle of the holometabolous insect. We used suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) to identify genes differentially expressed during larval molting and metamorphosis.


RESULTS
We performed SSH between tissues from a variety of developmental stages, including molting 5th and feeding 6th instar larvae, metamorphically committed and feeding 5th instar larvae, and feeding 5th instar and metamorphically committed larvae. One hundred expressed sequence tags (ESTs) were identified and included 73 putative genes with similarity to known genes, and 27 unknown ESTs. SSH results were further characterized by dot blot, Northern blot, and RT-PCR. The expression levels of eleven genes were found to change during larval molting or metamorphosis, suggesting a functional role during these processes.


CONCLUSIONS
These results provide a new set of genes expressed specifically during larval molt or metamorphosis that are candidates for further studies into the regulatory mechanisms of those stage-specific genes during larval molt and metamorphosis.
Dong
Du-Juan
DJ
School of Life Sciences, Shandong University, Jinan, China. dongdujuan@163.com <dongdujuan@163.com>
He
Hong-Juan
HJ
Chai
Lian-Qin
LQ
Jiang
Xiao-Juan
XJ
Wang
Jin-Xing
JX
Zhao
Xiao-Fan
XF
D000818:Animals; D020224:Expressed Sequence Tags; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; D019476:Insect Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D007814:Larva / Q000502:physiology*; D008675:Metamorphosis, Biological / Q000502:physiology*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D018978:Molting / Q000502:physiology*; D009036:Moths / Q000502:physiology*
D019476:Insect Proteins