Mahmoud Bagheri
Education & Extension Organization (AREO),Iran
Title: Identification and sequencing of bitterness gene (sgt1) in eggplant (Solanum melongena L.)
Biography
Biography: Mahmoud Bagheri
Abstract
One of the undesirable traits in eggplant is the bitterness of fruits. Eggplant specific piquant and bitter taste is mainly due to the presence of solasonine glycoalkaloid. Solasonine is generated and accumulated by adding sugars to solasodine alkaloid by solasodine glycosyltransferase (SGT) enzymes. These enzymes have been purified and characterized in eggplant, but the encoding genes have not been identified before. In this study, sgt1 gene sequences in solanaceae family were collected and conserved sites were specified by multi-alignment and proper primers were designed. DNA and RNA extraction and cDNA synthesis were conducted by related protocols. PCR reactions for DNA and cDNA, with different combinations of the designed primers, lead to amplification of various bands in different sizes between 200 to 3000 bp. These fragments were separated and sequenced. The obtained sequences were assayed and by elimination of overlap sites, sequences of encoding site of this gene were achieved. Bioinformatics' analysis illustrated high similarity between our got sequence and sgt1 gene sequences in other species of solanaceae family such as potato, tomato, pepper, and tobacco. Access to the sequence of sgt1 gene in eggplant can be a preliminary to similar studies and attainment to sgt2 and sgt3 sequences. Down expressing and silencing of these genes would result production of new eggplant genotypes with less bitterness and better quality.