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Plant grafting has been practiced widely in horticulture and proved as a useful tool in science. However, the mechanisms of graft healing or graft incompatibility remain poorly understood. In this study, Litchi chinensis cv. ‘Jingganghongnuo’ homograft (‘J/J’) and ‘Jingganghongnuo’/‘zhuangyuanhong’ heterograft (‘J/Z’) as compatible and incompatible combination, respectively, was used to study transcriptional changes between incompatible and compatible graft during graft union formation. Anatomical observation indicated that three stages (2 h, 14 d and 21 d after grafting) were critical for graft union formation and selected for high-throughput sequencing. Results indicated 6060 DEGs were differentially expressed in the compatible combination and 5267 DEGs exhibiting in the incompatible one. KEGG pathway enrichment analysis revealed that DEGs were involved in metabolism, wound response, phenylpropanoid biosynthesis and plant hormone signal transduction. The expression of 9 DEGs annotated in auxin pathway was up-regulated in compatible combination than that in incompatible combination. The IAA concentration confirmed that the IAA might promote the graft compatibility. In addition, 13 DEGs related to lignin biosynthesis were differentially expressed during graft healing process. Overall, our results provide abundant sequence resources for studying mechanisms underlying graft compatibility and establish a platform for further studies of litchi and other evergreen fruit trees.

Avocado is an economically important crop and widely cultivated in the tropical and subtropical regions of China, whereas little is known about its genetic diversification. Twenty-six EST-SSR markers were developed based on avocado EST sequences. Molecular characterization was applied to assess the genetic relationships among different accessions. In total, nine gSSRs and nine EST-SSRs were selected to illuminate the genetic relationships within the 92 samples. Diversity parameters associated to the selected markers indicated the relatively low genetic diversity and a certain degree of inbreeding in the 92 avocado accessions. Clustering method and principal coordinate analysis clearly distinguished the accessions in accordance to the botanical races and geographic regions by molecular characterization. Moreover, the botanical race or hybrids of some unknown race accessions from different geographic origins could be determined based on known genotypes in the same cluster..

Warm winters and hot springs may promote panicle leaf growing and repress floral development. To identify genes potentially involved in litchi panicle leaf senescence, eight RNA-sequencing (RNA-Seq) libraries of the senescing panicle leaves under low temperature (LT) conditions and the developing panicle leaves under high temperature (HT) conditions were constructed. For each library, 4.78&ndash, 8.99 &times, 106 clean reads were generated. Digital expression of the genes was compared between the senescing and developing panicle leaves. A total of 6477 upregulated differentially expressed genes (DEGs) (from developing leaves to senescing leaves), and 6318 downregulated DEGs were identified, 158 abscisic acid (ABA)-, 68 ethylene-, 107 indole-3-acetic acid (IAA)-, 27 gibberellic acid (GA)-, 68 cytokinin (CTK)-, 37 salicylic acid (SA)-, and 23 brassinolide (BR)-related DEGs. Confirmation of the RNA-Seq data by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis suggested that expression trends of the 10 candidate genes using qRT-PCR were similar to those revealed by RNA-Seq, and a significantly positive correlation between the obtained data from qRT-PCR and RNA-Seq were found, indicating the reliability of our RNA-Seq data. The present studies provided potential genes for the future molecular breeding of new cultivars that can induce panicle leaf senescence and reduce floral abortion under warm climates.

Litchi (Litchi chinesis Sonn.) is the most economically significant member of Sapindaceae family, especially in sub-tropical regions. However, its tall tree body often brings many inconveniences to production management. In order to modify the tree size or growth for productivity optimization and simplifying management, it is urgent to reveal the dwarf mechanism of litchi for dwarfing rootstocks or cultivar breeding. However, to date, the mechanisms on litchi dwarfism is still poor known. In the present study, transcriptome profiling were performed on L. chinensis cv. ‘Feizixiao’ (FZX, vigorous cultivar) and ‘Ziniangxi’ (ZNX, dwarf cultivar). A total of 55,810 unigenes were obtained, and 9,190 unigenes were differentially expressed between vigorous and dwarf litchi samples. Gene functional enrichment analysis indicated that the differentially expressed unigenes (DEGs) were related to phytohormone metabolism and signal transduction, and energy metabolism pathways. In particular, GA2ox were only up-regulated in ZNX samples, indicating GA might play an important role in regulating huge difference between vigorous and dwarf litchi cultivars. In addition, the 35S::LcGA2ox transgenic tobacco plants were dwarf and had smaller leaves or branches than wild type plants. Our study provided a series of candidate genes to reveal the mechanism of litchi dwarf.

Litchi has diverse fruit color phenotypes, yet no research reflects the biochemical background of this diversity. In this study, we evaluated 12 litchi cultivars for chromatic parameters and pigments, and investigated the effects of abscisic acid, forchlorofenron (CPPU), bagging and debagging treatments on fruit coloration in cv. Feizixiao, an unevenly red cultivar. Six genes encoding chalcone synthase (CHS), chalcone isomerase (CHI), flavanone 3-hydroxylase (F3H), dihydroflavonol 4-reductase (DFR), anthocyanidin synthase (ANS) and UDP-glucose: flavonoid 3-O-glucosyltransferase (UFGT) were isolated from the pericarp of the fully red litchi cv. Nuomici, and their expression was analyzed in different cultivars and under the above mentioned treatments. Pericarp anthocyanin concentration varied from none to 734 mg m(-2) among the 12 litchi cultivars, which were divided into three coloration types, i.e. non-red ('Kuixingqingpitian', 'Xingqiumili', 'Yamulong'and 'Yongxing No. 2'), unevenly red ('Feizixiao' and 'Sanyuehong') and fully red ('Meiguili', 'Baila', Baitangying' 'Guiwei', 'Nuomici' and 'Guinuo'). The fully red type cultivars had different levels of anthocyanin but with the same composition. The expression of the six genes, especially LcF3H, LcDFR, LcANS and LcUFGT, in the pericarp of non-red cultivars was much weaker as compared to those red cultivars. Their expression, LcDFR and LcUFGT in particular, was positively correlated with anthocyanin concentrations in the pericarp. These results suggest the late genes in the anthocyanin biosynthetic pathway were coordinately expressed during red coloration of litchi fruits. Low expression of these genes resulted in absence or extremely low anthocyanin accumulation in non-red cultivars. Zero-red pericarp from either immature or CPPU treated fruits appeared to be lacking in anthocyanins due to the absence of UFGT expression. Among these six genes, only the expression of UFGT was found significantly correlated with the pericarp anthocyanin concentration (r = 0.84). These results suggest that UFGT played a predominant role in the anthocyanin accumulation in litchi as well as pericarp coloration of a given cultivar.