Identification of genes involved in aromatic amino acid metabolism

To accurately detect and quantify low abundant transcripts no represented in current EST databases we generated an RNA-seq dataset based on RNA isolated from Petunia hybrida corolla tissue harvested at 8 PM at two developmental stages, day -1 (bud) and day 2 postanthesis (the tissues containing the lowest and highest levels of phenylalanine, respectively). Total RNA samples were obtained from corollas of at least eight wild-type petunia flowers per biological replicate at the two developmental stages using an RNeasy plant mini kit from Qiagen.