miRNAs in brinjal (Solanum melongena) mined through an in silico approach

Abstract

Plant micro-RNAs (miRNAs) are conserved and play important roles in abiotic stress responses or in plant responses to pathogen attack. Six miRNAs were identified in Solanum melongena (brinjal, eggplant) using bioinformatic methods from 98,089 EST sequences. Sixty-one potential mRNA targets were identified by homology searches of all six identified miRNAs against the Arabidopsis mRNA dataset using on-line miRU software (http://www.mirbase.org). The newly-identified miRNAs were studied further to compare their level of conservation with respect other family members. Later, the core promoter found in all targeted genes was identified and a highly-conserved GNAA motif with a critical role in the biogenesis of miRNAs was identified. The findings from this study will be useful for further research on the features of miRNAs and their mechanisms of gene regulation in S. melongena.