SAGE transcript profiling of the juvenile cambial region of Eucalyptus grandis
Mayra Costa da Cruz Gallo de Carvalho (1, 2), Danielle Gregorio Gomes Caldas (1, 2), Raphael Tozelli Carneiro (1, 2), David Henry Moon (1, 2), Guillermo Rafael Salvatierra (1), Lívia Maria Franceschini (1), Alexander de Andrade (1), Paola Alejandra Fiorani Celedon (1), Shinitiro Oda (3) and Carlos Alberto Labate (1, 4)
1. Laboratório Max Feffer de Genética de Plantas, Departamento de Genética, Escola Superior de Agricultura “Luiz de Queiroz”,
Universidade de São Paulo, Piracicaba-SP, Brazil / 2. These authors contributed equally to this work as first authors / 3. Suzano Papel e Celulose, Av. Brigadeiro Faria Lima No. 1355, 8° andar, CEP 01452-919, São Paulo-SP, Brazil / 4. Corresponding author () / Received August 20, 2007; accepted November 28, 2007; published online April 1, 2008
Summary
Despite the importance of Eucalyptus spp. in the pulp and paper industry, functional genomic approaches have only recently been applied to understand wood formation
in this genus. We attempted to establish a global view of gene expression in the juvenile cambial region of Eucalyptus grandis Hill ex Maiden. The expression profile was obtained from serial analysis of gene expression (SAGE) library data produced
from 3- and 6-year-old trees. Fourteen-base expressed sequence tags (ESTs) were searched against public Eucalyptus ESTs and annotated with GenBank. Altogether 43,304 tags were generated producing 3066 unigenes with three or more copies
each, 445 with a putative identity, 215 with unknown function and 2406 without an EST match. The expression profile of the
juvenile cambial region revealed the presence of highly frequent transcripts related to general metabolism and energy metabolism,
cellular processes, transport, structural components and information pathways. We made a quantitative analysis of a large
number of genes involved in the biosynthesis of cellulose, pectin, hemicellulose and lignin. Our findings provide insight
into the expression of functionally related genes involved in juvenile wood formation in young fast-growing E. grandis trees.
