Establishment and Large-scale Analysis of Full-length cDNA Libraries in Lotus japonicus

Abstract

The genome sequence project in Lotus japonicus has discovered non-homologous genes with Arabidopsis. Analyses of these unique genes would provide additional resources for gene information in various industrially useful plants and crops. We have prepared several full-length cDNA libraries from L. japonicus. To estimate functions of 24,105 UNIGENEs obtained from 139,727 ESTs, BLAST searches with public databases (1e-10) and GO categories were performed. Around 40% among the UNIGENEs were previously unknown. These non-homologous UNIGENEs with Arabidopsis are available for future analysis of the plant genetic diversity. In the putative amino acid sequences detected from full-length DNA sequences, we identified some protein families from Pfam database, e.g. retrotransposon gag proteins that control translation, heparin-binding protein family in the brain nervous system. We will explore L. japonicus specific full-length cDNA clones by comparative genome analyses with other model plants to character the L. japonicus specific genes.