Gene expression profiling of flag leaves at the booting stage in the japonica hybrid rice Huayou14 and its parental lines by microarray.

Gene expression profiling using microarray has contributed significantly to heterosis studies. Using the Affymetrix rice genome array, we investigated gene expression profiles in the flag leaves of the japonica hybrid rice Huayou14 and its parental cultivars Shen9A and Fan14 at the booting stage. A total of 2057 genes differentially expressed (fold change ≥2 or ≤0.5) between Huayou14 and its parents were identified. Functional classification of the differentially expressed genes by Gene Ontology (GO) analysis indicated the differentially expressed genes were significantly enriched in photosynthesis-related cellular component categories (e.g. photosystem Ⅰ, chloroplast membrane and chloroplast envelope), and biological process categories (e.g. chlorophyll catabolic, chlorophyll biosynthetic and carotenoid biosynthetic processes). These results suggest that the changes in the photosynthetic ability of the japonica hybrid rice Huayou14 may be related to heterosis. Metabolic pathway analysis indicated that differentially expressed genes were significantly enriched in photosynthesis-antenna proteins and starch and sucrose metabolic pathways, instead of photosynthesis and carbon fixation pathways as reported previously. These results suggest that different genes or metabolic pathways might contribute to the heterosis of different hybrid combinations.