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5′-SAGE Studies Reveal a Transcriptomic Switch During Fruiting Body Development in Coprinopsis cinerea

Summary

This research examined how genes are turned on and off when mushrooms begin to develop from simple fungal threads into complex fruiting bodies. The scientists studied the model mushroom species Coprinopsis cinerea and identified thousands of genes that change their activity levels during early mushroom formation. This helps explain how mushrooms coordinate their development at the molecular level. Impacts on everyday life: – Improved understanding of mushroom cultivation and production – Better methods for growing edible and medicinal mushrooms – Potential applications in biotechnology and pharmaceutical development – Insights into fungal biology relevant to agriculture and food production – Knowledge that could help develop new strains of mushrooms with desired properties

Background

The transition from vegetative mycelium to primordium during fruiting body development is the most complex and critical developmental event in the life cycle of many basidiomycete fungi. Understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying this process has long been a goal of research on basidiomycetes. Large scale assessment of expressed transcriptomes during these developmental stages is needed to better understand the mushroom fruiting process.

Objective

To analyze the transcriptomes and identify up-regulated genes between vegetative mycelium (Myc) and stage 1 primordium (S1-Pri) of Coprinopsis cinerea during fruiting body development using 5′-Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (5′-SAGE) coupled with high-throughput pyrosequencing.

Results

The study evaluated expression of over 3,000 genes and found that almost one-third were preferentially expressed in either mycelium or primordium stage, indicating a significant transcriptome turnover during fruiting body development. Over 79,000 transcription start sites were annotated. GO and KEGG analyses showed various structural and functional protein families were uniquely employed in either stage. During primordial growth, cellular metabolism was highly up-regulated. Several signaling pathways including cAMP-PKA, MAPK and TOR pathways were identified as up-regulated. More than 100 up-regulated genes were found to be unique to mushroom-forming basidiomycetes.

Conclusion

The study revealed numerous new candidate genes important to early stages of mushroom fruiting development, though their precise molecular functions and biological roles are not yet fully known. The findings advance understanding of molecular mechanisms underlying fruiting body development in the model mushroom C. cinerea and may be applicable to other basidiomycetes that form fruiting bodies.
  • Published in:BMC Genomics,
  • Study Type:Gene Expression Analysis,
  • Source: 10.1186/1471-2164-14-195
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