Transcriptomic analysis of H. perforatum L. pistils for the identification of genes related to aposporous apomixis.. Hypericum perforatum

Apomixis defines a number of reproductive strategies, which, unlike sexual reproduction, permit the inheritance of the maternal genome over generations without genetic recombination events. The key biological features of apomixis are the failure of meiosis (i.e., apomeiosis), the differentiation of unreduced embryo sacs and eggs, and their autonomous development in functional embryos through parthenogenesis and the formation of viable endosperm either via fertilization-independent means or following fertilization with a sperm cell (Koltunow and Grossniklaus 2003). Recently gained biological information has shown that H. perforatum is an attractive model system for the study of a naturally occurring form of asexual reproduction called aposporous apomixis, This research describes a global gene expression analysis of H. perforatum ovaries collected from sexual and aposporous plant accessions for the purpose of identifying genes and processes potentially associated with aposporous apomixis in this model species. Overall design: Pistils were collected from three sexual and three apomictic plants at developmental points corresponding to the Arabidopsis flower stages 10 and 14. Pistils were collected and immediately frozen in liquid nitrogen. To minimize biological variation 15 pistils were collected from each plant.