Zea mays Transcriptome or Gene expression. Zea mays

Phenotypes of maize male sterile 8 plants are small anthers, meiotic failure, shorter epidermal cells, and non-secreting tapetal cells. Excess callose accumulates around meiotic cells, which later abort. Thousands of transcriptome changes occur including ectopic activation of genes not expressed in fertile siblings, failure to express genes, and differential expression of genes shared with fertile siblings. Sixty-three differentially expressed proteins were identified after 2-D DIGE followed by LC/MS/MS, including those involved in metabolism and cell division. The majority were not identified by differential RNA expression. Keywords: anther development, maize, male-sterile, ms8 Overall design: 4 replicates of ms8 mutant and 4 replicates of ms8 fertile siblings at 3 anther stages. Spike-in controls were included.