title: Conservation and functional influence of alternative splicing in wood formation of Populus and Eucalyptus.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Wood formation in tree species is regulated by multiple factors at various layers. Alternative splicing (AS) occurs within a large number of genes in wood formation. However, the functional implications and conservation of the AS occurrence are not well understood.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In this study, we profiled AS events in wood-forming tissues of Populus and Eucalyptus, and analyzed their functional implications as well as inter-species conservation. 28.3% and 20.7% of highly expressed transcripts in the developing xylem of Populus and Eucalyptus respectively were affected by AS events. Around 42% of the AS events resulted in changes to the original reading frame. 25.0% (in Populus) and 26.8% (in Eucalyptus) of the AS events may cause protein domain modification. In the process of wood formation, about 28% of AS-occurring genes were putative orthologs and 71 conserved AS events were identified in the two species.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Through analysis of AS events in developing xylem of two tree species, this study reveals an array of new information regarding AS occurrence and function in tree development.
authors.forename: Peng
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Yimeng
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kong
authors.forename: Dongliang
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Cheng
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Xuan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Plant Molecular Genetics and Key Laboratory of Synthetic Biology, Institute of Plant Physiology and Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 300 Fenglin Rd, Shanghai, 200032, China. lgli@sibs.ac.cn.
authors.forename: Laigeng
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D017398:Alternative Splicing; D005052:Eucalyptus / Q000235:genetics*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; D010940:Plant Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D032107:Populus / Q000235:genetics*; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000032:analysis; D018749:RNA, Plant / Q000032:analysis; D017423:Sequence Analysis, RNA; D014934:Wood / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D010940:Plant Proteins; D012333:RNA, Messenger; D018749:RNA, Plant