Transcriptome profiling of tobacco pollen and pollen tubes

Pollen tube growth is essential for plant fertilization and reproduction. Although cellular and regulatory processes underlying pollen tube elongation have been extensively studied, a comprehensive understanding of global gene expression in pollen and pollen tubes is missing. In this study, RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) technology was applied to assemble a Nicotiana tabacum male gametophytic transcriptome and to compare transcriptome profiles at two different stages of gametophyte development: mature pollen grains (MPG) and pollen tubes grown for six hours in vitro (PT6).