Gloriosa superba and Colchicum autumnale Trascriptomes: Computational Mapping and Identification of Rhizome-specific Genes

Gloriosa superba and Colchicum autumnale are rhizome-producing plants from the Colchicaceae family, which is known for their production of colchicine, a FDA approved gout drug that also has anticancer properties. In order to improve the biomanufacturing of colchicine, understanding and identifying the biorhizome-specific and developmental genes are necessary. RNA-Seq was used to identify the rhizome-specific and developmental genes from G. superba and C. autumnale. The transcriptome of both species were compared against NCBI protein databases. Computational mapping revealed 32312 assembled multiple-tissue transcripts of G. superba represented 15089 unigenes and C. autumnale has 60927, which represents 21948 unigenes in known plant specific gene ontology (GO). Further GO analysis was used to identify known rhizome-specific and developmental genes in G. superba and C. autumnale, utilizing Blast2GO and CLC Genomics Workbench. We will present the identified rhizome-specific and developmental genes, which could help to improve the biomanufacturing of colchicine.