Analysis of gene expression in response to water deficit of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) varieties differing in drought tolerance

Abstract

Chickpea (C. arietinum L.) ranks third in food legume crop production in the world. However, drought poses a serious threat to chickpea production, and development of drought-resistant varieties is a necessity. Unfortunately, cultivated chickpea has a high morphological but narrow genetic diversity, and understanding the genetic processes of this plant is hindered by the fact that the chickpea genome has not yet been sequenced and its EST resources are limited. In this study, two chickpea varieties having contrasting levels of drought-tolerance were analyzed for differences in transcript profiling during drought stress treatment by withdrawal of irrigation at different time points. Transcript profiles of ESTs derived from subtractive cDNA libraries constructed with RNA from whole seedlings of both varieties were analyzed at different stages of stress treatment.