Preliminary characterization of a death-related gene in silkworm Bombyx mori

In order to study the mechanism of programmed cell death (PCD) in silkworm Bombyx mori, we employed suppressive subtractive hybridization to screen associated genes. In this study, a novel gene was isolated from B. mori, which may be involved in PCD as analyzed by bioinformatics and it was named as DRP (death-related protein) gene. RT-PCR analysis showed and prokaryotic expression. Through RT-PCR analysis of death-related protein gene in different tissues and different developmental stage of B. mori, it showed the distributed condition of the gene. It was widely expressed in various tissues and mainly expressed in testis, malphigian vessels, posterior intestine, silk gland. Meanwhile, it was widely expressed in virous developmental stages and mainly expressed in egg, indicating its possible roles in development of programmed cell death. We also tested the expression of this gene in prokaryotic system, which may be useful for subsequent studies. This gene is registered in GenBank under the accession number FJ447481.