Analysis of German cockroach (Blattella germanica) expressed sequence tags

Cockroaches are known to act not only as vectors for parasites and pathogenic microorganisms but also as intermediate hosts for parasite development and allergens. It is necessary to understand genomic information to obtain ecological knowledge of the cockroach as well as to more effectively engineer genetic cockroach control, in addition to developing allergy medications and analyzing the allergen. We constructed a cDNA library of German cockroach Blattella germanica (Orthoptera: Blattellidae) and generated 5,466 clones expressed by EST sequences analysis. A total of 3,937 sequences were identified by a BLAST search against the NCBI nr database under an E-value of <1e−5 using BLASTX programs. The database of Clusters of Orthologous Groups of proteins was used to attempt a functional study with an E-value of <1e−10, which resulted in 2,833 significant sequence matches. We identified several kinds of allergens, proteases, serine proteases, serine protease inhibitors, stress-related proteins, immune response-related proteins, and a variety of other genes. This genomic data can provide essential information about cockroaches, including data on metamorphosis, metabolism, and intracellular signaling. This genomic information of the German cockroach can also supply knowledge for cockroach control and allergen analysis as well as genome comparison among similar species.