Identification of the transcripts involving in drought tolerance in Aeluropus littoralis using cDNA-AFLP technique

Drought stress، as the most important limiting factor، affected the growth and production of crops. In this study، cDNA-AFLP technique was used to identify transcripts involved in drought stress Polyethylene Glycol (PEG) at three levels: 0 (control)، -0. 9- and -1. 4 MPa in Aeluropus littoralis which is the closest family to cereal. Among 21 isolated ESTs، 17 ESTs were obtained with the average length of 270 bp and 80% sequencing efficiency. The nucleotide sequences were compared with those in the GenBank database. Approximately 72% of the ESTs show homology to nucleotide or amino acid sequences in the GenBank database and 5 ESTs show no significant similarity to other protein and nucleic acid sequences identified in other organisms in the GenBank database which considered as novel and potential genes. Totally، 17 ESTs were recorded in NCBI database which are included zinc finger CCCH domain-containing protein، glyoxalase I and aspartic proteinase and the role of them in drought stress were discussed. These results can be effective to understand the molecular basis of drought resistance and genetic engineering in the improvement of crops resistance against stress and the production of resistant plants.