Bioinformatics applied to systems biology for regulatory factors identification of the sucrose accumulation in sugarcane stalk

Abstract

Sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) is one of the most important cultivated grasses of the world and Brazil is the largest producer, which has as its main representative the São Paulo state that concentrating more than half the area for this crop. Thus, it is necessary a high understanding of the mechanisms that regulate the sucrose accumulation in this plant. The genetic mechanisms that control sugarcane sucrose accumulation have been studied at various levels, such as gene identification and localization, identification of quantitative trait locus controlling, transcriptome, proteome, characterization and metabolites identification. With all these studies is evident the necessity for a holistic approach to global understanding of the plant during the sucrose accumulation. Thus, this work aims to characterize metabolites and proteins during plant development and sucrose accumulation, using bioinformatics to link these results by Bayesian networks in a systems biology approach. Therefore, it will be possible to create a gene regulation network, identification of new gene functions, pathways and phenotypes related to the sugarcane sucrose accumulation. All information generated in this project will be integrated into SUCEST-FUN (http://sucest-fun.org/) servers, allowing users to a crosslink between the data from transcriptomics, metabolomics, proteomics, molecular markers (such as E-QTLs and QTLs ) or any other service available on the server.