[cDNA libraries construction and screening in gene expression profiling of disease resistance in wheat]

A wheat line, Bai Nong 3217/Mardler BC5F4 with resistance to powdery mildew, was used to construct a conventional cDNA library and a suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) cDNA library from wheat leaves inoculated by Erysiphe graminis DC. Three hundred and eighty-seven non-redundant ESTs from the conventional cDNA library and 760 ESTs from the SSH cDNA library were obtained, and the ESTs similarity analysis using BLASTn and BLASTx were conducted by comparing these ESTs with sequences in GenBank. The results showed that the redundancy of some kinds of genes such as photosynthesis related genes and ribosome related genes was higher in the conventional cDNA library but the varieties and quantities of disease resistance genes were less than those in the SSH cDNA library. The SSH cDNA library was found to have obvious advantages in gene expression profiling of disease resistance such as simple library construction procedure, rich specific DRR (disease-resistance-related) genes and decreased sequencing amount. To acquire genes that were involved in the powdery mildew resistance of wheat, hybridization with high-density dots membranes was used to screen the two libraries. The result showed that the method was relatively simple in operation, and the membranes could be used for many times. But some problems also existed with this screening method. For instance, a large amount of mRNA and radioactive isotope were needed and the hybridization procedure must be repeated several times to obtain stable hybridization results. About 54.1% function-known ESTs in the SSH cDNA library were identified to be DRR genes by screening. There were 247 clones of the SSH cDNA library that had positive signal in the repeated hybridizations with the pathogen uninfected probe. The identified DRR genes distributed in the whole procedure of powdery mildew resistance, but mainly focused on the SAR (systemic of acquired resistance).