Transcriptome and genome size analysis of the Venus flytrap

PLoS One. 2015 Apr 17;10(4):e0123887. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0123887. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

The insectivorous Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula) is renowned from Darwin's studies of plant carnivory and the origins of species. To provide tools to analyze the evolution and functional genomics of D. muscipula, we sequenced a normalized cDNA library synthesized from mRNA isolated from D. muscipula flowers and traps. Using the Oases transcriptome assembler 79,165,657 quality trimmed reads were assembled into 80,806 cDNA contigs, with an average length of 679 bp and an N50 length of 1,051 bp. A total of 17,047 unique proteins were identified, and assigned to Gene Ontology (GO) and classified into functional categories. A total of 15,547 full-length cDNA sequences were identified, from which open reading frames were detected in 10,941. Comparative GO analyses revealed that D. muscipula is highly represented in molecular functions related to catalytic, antioxidant, and electron carrier activities. Also, using a single copy sequence PCR-based method, we estimated that the genome size of D. muscipula is approx. 3 Gb. Our genome size estimate and transcriptome analyses will contribute to future research on this fascinating, monotypic species and its heterotrophic adaptations.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Droseraceae / genetics*
  • Gene Library
  • Genome, Plant*
  • Molecular Sequence Annotation
  • RNA, Messenger / metabolism
  • Sequence Analysis, DNA
  • Transcriptome*

Substances

  • RNA, Messenger

Associated data

  • SRA/SRX312294

Grants and funding

This work was supported by a grant to JM from the Danish Research Council (#DFF-1323-00267; http://ufm.dk/forskning-og-innovation/rad-og-udvalg/det-frie-forskningsrad/radet/dff-natur-og-univers). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.