Transcriptomic analysis of a white-to-red skin color reversion in grapevine (Vitis vinifera L. cv. ´Moscatel Galego´)

Despite fruit pigmentation is one of the best studied phenomena affected by somatic variation in grapevine, there are no genome-wide analyses to date that account for the effects of this type of variation. In this study, we analyzed the transcriptomic and metabolic consequences of a berry skin color reversion (from a non-pigmented to a anthocyanin-pigmented phenotype) in this species, by studying two near-isogenic backgrounds of cv. ´Moscatel Galego´. We determined the genetic nature of the color reversion and performed transcript profiling by performing Illumina RNAseq of berry skin samples of both variants at the onset of ripening (veraison) and early-ripening (2 weeks after veraison) berry stages. We also performed quantification of anthocyanins and stilbenes.