Transcriptome profiling shows gene regulation patterns in ginsenoside pathway in response to methyl jasmonate in Panax Quinquefolium adventitious root

Here, we combine elicitors and transcriptomics to investigate the inducible biosynthesis of the ginsenoside from the Panax quinquefolium. Treatment of P. quinquefolium adventitious root with methyl jasmonate (MJ) results in an increase in ginsenoside content (43.66 mg/g compared to 8.32 mg/g in control group). Therefore, we sequenced the transcriptome of native and MJ treated adventitious root in order to elucidate the key differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the ginsenoside biosynthetic pathway. Through DEG analysis, we found that 5,759 unigenes were up-regulated and 6,389 unigenes down-regulated in response to MJ treatment. Several defense-related genes (48) were identified, participating in salicylic acid (SA), jasmonic acid (JA), nitric oxide (NO) and abscisic acid (ABA) signal pathway. Additionally, we mapped 72 unigenes to the ginsenoside biosynthetic pathway. Four cytochrome P450s (CYP450) were likely to catalyze hydroxylation at C-16 (c15743_ g1, c39772_ g1, c55422_ g1) and C-30 (c52011_ g1) of the triterpene backbone. UDP-xylose synthases (c52571_ g3) was selected as the candidate, which was likely to involve in ginsenoside Rb-3 biosynthesis.