Transcriptome Analysis Revealing the Absence of Unintended Effects Both in Aerial and Underground Portions of Transgenic Rice (Oryza sativa L.) Huahui 1
Abstract：Unintended effects of genetically modified (GM) plants should be paid particular attention in the process of safety assessment of GM crops and their products, especially in regard to some long-term and potential food safety issues. To our knowledge, few research concerning on revealing possible unintended effects in underground portions of GM plants. In this study, with the aim to comprehensively investigate unintended effects of transgenic rice (Oryza sativa cv.) Huahui 1 (HH1), we performed DNA microarray analysis both in aerial and underground portions of HH1 and compared to its non-transgenic parent (Oryza sativa) Minghui 63 (MH63). The expression level of 8 genes located within 100 kb up and down-stream of insertion site of HH1 were not changed significantly. Considerable differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and significantly changed pathways were identified. The results showed that all these changes were not enough to cause obviously unintended effects both in aerial and underground portions of transgenic rice HH1. In addition, our study provides a clue to investigate unintended effects of GM plants in further safety assessment.
