title: Preparation and analysis of an expressed sequence tag library from the toxic dinoflagellate Alexandrium catenella.
abstract: Dinoflagellates of the genus Alexandrium are photosynthetic microalgae that have an extreme importance due to the impact of some toxic species on shellfish aquaculture industry. Alexandrium catenella is the species responsible for the production of paralytic shellfish poisoning in Chile and other geographical areas. We have constructed a cDNA library from midexponential cells of A. catenella grown in culture free of associated bacteria and sequenced 10,850 expressed sequence tags (ESTs) that were assembled into 1,021 contigs and 5,475 singletons for a total of 6,496 unigenes. Approximately 41.6% of the unigenes showed similarity to genes with predicted function. A significant number of unigenes showed similarity with genes from other dinoflagellates, plants, and other protists. Among the identified genes, the most expressed correspond to those coding for proteins of luminescence, carbohydrate metabolism, and photosynthesis. The sequences of 9,847 ESTs have been deposited in Gene Bank (accession numbers EX 454357-464203).
authors.affiliation: Fundación Ciencia para la Vida, Av. Zañartu 1482, Nuñoa, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Paulina
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Uribe
authors.forename: Daniela
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Fuentes
authors.forename: Jorge
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Valdés
authors.forename: Amir
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Shmaryahu
authors.forename: Alicia
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zúñiga
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Holmes
authors.forename: Pablo D T
authors.initials: PD
authors.lastname: Valenzuela
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D020451:Contig Mapping; D016054:DNA, Protozoan / Q000235:genetics; D030541:Databases, Genetic; D004141:Dinoflagellida / Q000235:genetics*; D020224:Expressed Sequence Tags; D015723:Gene Library; D023281:Genomics; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D016054:DNA, Protozoan