Abstract:

【Objective】 By identifying the differentially expressed transcripts of anthers at the critical period of abortion between cytoplasmic male sterility and maintainer lines of Gossypium harknessii, this study is to explore the possible molecular mechanism of the cytoplasmic male sterility, and lay a basis on utilizing cytoplasmic male sterility lines. 【Method】 cDNA amplified fragment length polymorphism analysis was used to isolate the differentially expressed fragments, these fragments were verified by reverse Northern blot, and then were cloned, sequenced and analyzed by bioinformatic tools. 【Result】 Totally, 108 differentially expressed fragments were identified, of which, 67 were succeeded in cloning. Homology searches performed by BLAST at web servers of NCBI showed that there were 29 fragments could be found homology sequences in GenBank database. By analyzing the Gene Ontology of these 29 sequences, it could be concluded that these sequences mainly participated in signal transducer, transcription, energy metabolism, cell wall development. Among them, some differentially expressed genes related to RNA edit and male gametogenesis were identified between two materials, and these maybe the mainl factors of male sterility. 【Conclusion】 The results may help to understand the relevant gene regulatory networks of cytoplasmic male sterility of cotton, and provide a pilot platform for further investigating the mechanism of CMS.

Key words: Gossypium harknessii, CMS, cDNA-AFLP, gene expression, molecular mechanism