Single-molecule sequencing of maize and sorghum developmental tissues

In this study, we compared the transcriptome map of maize and sorghum using PacBio single-molecule long-read sequencing from multiple matched tissues in each species. Maize and sorghum are both important crops with similar overall plant architectures, but they have key differences, especially in regard to their inflorescences. To better understand these two organisms at the molecular level, we compared the transcriptional profiles of both protein-coding and non-coding transcripts in matched tissues using large-scale single-molecule sequencing from 130 RSII cells and 5 Sequel cells, as well as deep short-read RNA sequencing. The use of multiple size-fractionated libraries (<1 kb, 1–2 kb, 2–3 kb, 3–5 kb, and >5 kb) enhanced our capture of non-redundant transcripts in these tissues.