Knowledge About Transcriptome Sequencing

In a broad sense, the transcriptome refers to the collection of all transcripts in a cell under a certain physiological condition, including messenger RNA, ribosomal RNA, transfer RNA and non-coding RNA; in a narrow sense, it refers to the collection of all mRNAs. Protein is the main bearer of cell function, proteome is the most direct description of cell function and state, transcriptome is the main means to study gene expression, and is an inevitable link connecting the genetic information of the genome and the proteome of biological functions. The regulation of transcription level is the most studied and the most important regulation method of organisms.

Ⅰ. Next-generation transcriptome sequencing

RNA-Seq (RNA-sequencing), also known as transcriptome sequencing, is a newly developed technology that uses next-generation sequencing technology for transcriptome analysis. Sequence information and expression information of all transcripts, including protein-coding mRNA and various non-coding RNAs, expression abundance of different transcripts generated by gene alternative splicing, etc. While analyzing the structure and expression level of transcripts, unknown transcripts and rare transcripts are also found, so as to accurately analyze important issues in life sciences such as gene expression differences, gene structure variations, and screening molecular markers.

In addition, RNA-Seq can directly analyze the transcriptome of most organisms, because it does not need to know the gene information of the target species, which shows a special advantage. Before the advent of RNA-Seq, there was a limited understanding of the transcriptome. RNA-Seq has been shown to be efficient and fast, and has largely changed people's understanding of the transcriptome.

Ⅱ. Transcriptome sequencing platform

Both high-throughput sequencing platforms can sequence the transcriptome. Since the two platforms have their own advantages and disadvantages, they need to be flexibly selected for different sample conditions. The advantage of transcriptome sequencing technology is that the amount of data obtained by a single sequencing is large, higher coverage can be obtained, and more low-abundance transcripts can be detected, which is more advantageous in the transcriptome analysis of species with known genome sequences. It has more advantages in the transcriptome analysis of unknown genome sequence species, and its longer read length facilitates splicing and better transcript data can be obtained.

Ⅲ. Functions of transcriptome sequencing products

1. Obtain transcript information of species or tissues;

2. Obtain information about genes on transcripts, such as: gene structure, function, etc.;

3. Discover new genes;

4. Gene structure optimization;

5. Discovery of variable shearing;

6. Discover gene fusion;

7. Differential analysis of gene expression.