Rice Female Meiosis: Genome-Wide mRNA, Small RNA, and DNA Methylation Analysis During Ovule Development

Abstract

Meiosis is an essential process in sexual life cycle, not only for the genomic stability maintenance but also for the genetic diversity creation through recombination. In rice ovule, megaspore mother cells undergo meiosis to form megaspores; then the functional megaspore performs three rounds of mitoses to form female gametophyte. However, the mechanism of gene expression and regulation in female meiosis process is still poorly understood. As important gene regulatory factors, miRNAs and DNA methylation are widely involved in plant meiosis and ovule development. In order to systematically study the potential mechanism of gene expression and regulation in female meiosis, ovules at megaspore mother cell meiosis stage, functional megaspore mitosis stage, and mature female gametophytes are collected to perform genome-wide RNA sequencing, small RNA sequencing, and bisulfite sequencing. Through bioinformatics analysis, we obtained many differentially expressed genes, miRNAs, and differentially methylated genes related to female meiosis. These data may provide important clues for further revealing the mechanism of female meiosis in rice.