Comparative Analysis of Transcriptomes Connected with Sex Expression in Cucumber

Cucumber is an economically important vegetable crops and it is very good model for investigating sexual development. In order to gain more insight in sex-related gene expression of cucumber we performed transcriptome sequencing of apical meristem and leaves of six line possessing flowers of different sex. Our goal was to isolate genes involved in flower morphogenesis. Using Solexa technology, we generated above 70 million reads for each sample. Between 89% and 94% reads were aligned onto reference genome, of which above 84% uniquely. 28,191 out of 30,364 transcripts have been reported with 10 or more reads. 2,852 genes were found differentially expressed between generative and vegetative tissue. Genes expressed specifically in generative tissues were selected, for male, female and hermaphrodite, respectively. We performed their functional annotation and gene ontology classification. Genes up-regulated in generative tissues were involved in hormone signaling, enzymatic activity and transcription factor processing.

Acknowledgements: This research was supported by National Science Center (project No. NCN 2011/01/B/NZ2/01631).