Current safety assess
ment for no
vel crops, including transgenic crops, uses a targeted approach, which relies on co
mpositional analysis. The possibility that transgene expression could lead to unintended effects re
mains a debated issue. This study used transcripto
me profiling as a nontargeted approach to e
valuate o
verall
molecular changes in transgenic soybean culti
vars. Global gene expression was
measured in the first trifoliate lea
ves of two transgenic and three con
ventional soybean culti
vars using the soybean Affy
metrix GeneChip. It was found that gene expression differs
more between the two con
ventional culti
vars than between the transgenics and their closest con
ventional culti
var in
vestigated and that the
magnitudes of differences
measured in gene expression and genotype (deter
mined by SSR analysis) do not necessarily correlate. A MySQL database coupled with a CGI Web interface was de
veloped to store and present the results (
v.mcgill.ca/" target="_blank">http://soyxpress.agrenv.mcgill.ca/). By integrating the
microarray data with gene annotations and other soybean data, a co
mprehensi
ve
view of differences in gene expression is explored between culti
vars.