Overexpression of GmDof4 from Soybean Significantly Enhances the Lipid Content of Chlorella ellipsoidea

Here, we transferred GmDof4 from soybean (Glycine max), a transcription factor affecting content of lipid in Arabidopsis, into C. ellipsoidea and found that the expression of GmDof4 significantly enhanced the lipid content by maximum 57.21%, shifted the content of different fatty acids, but did not affect the growth of the host cells. Using the Solexa/Illumina-based RNA-Seq analysis, we found expression of GmDof4 significantly regulates 1,076 genes, of which 754 genes were up-regulated and 322 genes were down-regulated, under mixotrophic culture. This study provides a new way to improve the lipid of microalgae. Overall design: The GmDof4 transgenic strain Dof4-1 and control (pCK transgenic line CK-1) were cultured in liquid antibiotic-free Endo medium at 25? under illumination (100 µmol photons m-2 s-1) for 120 h. Cells at a concentration of approximately 1× 10^7 cells/mL were collected for library construction and sequencing using Illumina GAIIx.