Basidiomatal formation in Antrodia cinnamomea from the perspective of gene expression

In order to understand the phenomenon of morphological differentiation in medicinal fungus Antrodia cinnamomea, two complementary DNA (cDNA) libraries were constructed from the liquid-cultured mycelia (AM) and natural basidiomes (AT) produced from the infested wood. Using single-passed sequencing of cDNA clones, 821 and 993 high-quality expressed sequence tags (ESTs) were generated from the liquidcultured mycelial and wild basidiomatal cDNA libraries, respectively. The results from BLASTX search revealed that only 32.5% to 33.7% of ESTs showed significant similarity to protein sequences in public databases (E values <= 10(-10)). The cDNAs encoding genes related to metabolism were found to be most abundant, followed by genes involved in protein fate and protein synthesis in each category. Genes related to the "Cell fate, cell cycle, and DNA processing" category showed the greatest difference between the liquid-cultured mycelial and wild basidiomatal cDNA libraries, followed by genes involved in metabolism. The results from this study have provided valuable sequence information, which may lead to improved production of basidiomes of A. cinnamomea and regulation of metabolites in the future.