Metabolite Profiling of Different Sweet sorghum cultivars Seeds

Background: Sorghum bicolor is one of the most important cereal crops in the world and is widely grown in arid or semi-arid areas. Results This study focused on the metabolic Diversity of three Sweet sorghum cultivars with white, red, and purple seeds to elucidate the factors responsible for the differences in Seed color. We found 651 metabolites were divided into 24 categories including Lipids_Fatty acids, Lipids_Glycerolipids, Flavonoid, Benzoic acid derivatives, Anthocyanins, Nucleotide and its derivates, etc. Through clustering analysis, principal component analysis (PCA), and orthogonal signal correction and partial least squares-discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA), different samples were clearly separated. It shows that contained metabolites of three groups are quite different. There are 217 significantly different metabolites between Z27 and HC4 (106 down-regulated, 111up-regulated), 240 between Z6 and HC4 (58 down-regulated, 182 up-regulated), 199 between Z6 and Z27 (54 down-regulated, 135 up-regulated). Venn diagram analysis indicated that 45 the differential metabolites were common to all three comparison groups. Conclusions This study provides new insights into the differences of metabolites between different color seeds and provides theoretical basis for the sufficient utilization of Sweet sorghum cultivars.