The bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria) is an important horticultural and medicinal crop with high nutritional value. This study aimed at examining the molecular regulation of fruit size in bottle gourd. We performed transcriptome sequencing of two bottle gourd cultivars differing in their fruit size. The average fruit length and weight of the cultivar Hang (39.48 cm/624.4 g) were higher than those of the cultivar USA (10.34 cm/152.8 g) at maturity. Transcriptome sequencing and assembly resulted in 89,347 unigenes. A total of 1250 differentially expressed genes (DEG) were found between the two cultivars, including 422 upregulated genes and 828 downregulated genes in Hang as compared to USA. Genes related to cell wall metabolism, phytohormones, cell cycle, and cell division showed significant differential expression between the two cultivars. DEGs encoding transcription factors (TF) from nine TF families were also identified. The ethylene response factor family was the most enriched among these families. Our study provides a basis for further investigations of the molecular regulation of fruit size in bottle gourd.
Keywords: Lagenaria siceraria; candidate genes; fruit size; gene expression; transcription factors.