Microarray analysis of developing fruits from transgenic lines with increased or reduced SlARF9 mRNA levels in tomato.. Solanum lycopersicum

The transformation of the ovary into a fruit after successful completion of pollination and fertilization has been associated with many changes at transcriptomic level. These changes are part of a dynamic and complex regulatory network that is controlled by phytohormones, with a major role for auxin. One of the auxin-related genes differentially expressed upon fruit set and early tomato fruit development is Solanum lycopersicum ARF9 (SlARF9). To explore the physiological role of SlARF9 in tomato fruit set and development, we generated transgenic tomato lines in which the gene was overexpressed or silenced, and used microarray analysis to identify possible transcriptomic changes associated with the fruit developmental phenotypes observed in the transgenic lines. Overall design: The transcript profiling analysis was done using pericarp tissue from fruits, 3-4mm in diameter, with each sample containing the pericarp of two fruits. For each seperate transgenic line, tissues were pooled from 2-3 plants (T2), resulting in a total of 6 samples for SlARF9-OE, 7 samples for SlARF9-RNAi, and 2 samples for wild type. The transcript profiling analysis was carried out using affymetrix EUTOM3 tomato exon array.