title: De novo transcriptome of safflower and the identification of putative genes for oleosin and the biosynthesis of flavonoids.
abstract: Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L.) is one of the most extensively used oil crops in the world. However, little is known about how its compounds are synthesized at the genetic level. In this study, Solexa-based deep sequencing on seed, leaf and petal of safflower produced a de novo transcriptome consisting of 153,769 unigenes. We annotated 82,916 of the unigenes with gene annotation and assigned functional terms and specific pathways to a subset of them. Metabolic pathway analysis revealed that 23 unigenes were predicted to be responsible for the biosynthesis of flavonoids and 8 were characterized as seed-specific oleosins. In addition, a large number of differentially expressed unigenes, for example, those annotated as participating in anthocyanin and chalcone synthesis, were predicted to be involved in flavonoid biosynthesis pathways. In conclusion, the de novo transcriptome investigation of the unique transcripts provided candidate gene resources for studying oleosin-coding genes and for investigating genes related to flavonoid biosynthesis and metabolism in safflower.
authors.affiliation: Ministry of Education Engineering Research Center of Bioreactor and Pharmaceutical Development, Jilin Agricultural University, Changchun, Jilin, China.
authors.forename: Haiyan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Yuanyuan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Dong
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Xiuming
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Yanfang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Na
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Yao
authors.forename: Lili
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Guan
authors.forename: Nan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Jinyu
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: Xiaokun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D053898:Biosynthetic Pathways / Q000235:genetics; D031187:Carthamus tinctorius / Q000235:genetics*; D005419:Flavonoids / Q000096:biosynthesis*; D035264:Flowers / Q000235:genetics; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling / Q000379:methods*; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; D015723:Gene Library; D017343:Genes, Plant / Q000235:genetics*; D056726:Genetic Association Studies; D058977:Molecular Sequence Annotation; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000235:genetics; D010940:Plant Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012639:Seeds / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D059467:Transcriptome / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D005419:Flavonoids; D010940:Plant Proteins; D012333:RNA, Messenger