Analysis of expressed receptor-like kinases (RLKs) in soybean

Receptor-like kinases (RLKs) play crucial roles in cellular signal perception and propagation. To study the evolutionary relationships among RLKs in soybean, a large-scale expressed sequence tags (ESTs) survey for RLKs-related sequences was conducted. By doing BLAST analysis using our database and The Gene Index Database, 605 putative RLK genes were identified. Based on the phylogeny of the kinase domain, these soybean RLKs were classified into 58 different small subfamilies. The phylogenetic analysis of RLKs in soybean, rice and Arabidopsis showed that different subfamilies of RLKs had different functions and could have experienced different selective pressures.