Research advances on transcriptomics in forage plants

The forage plants are important basis for developing grassland animal husbandry. With the development of high-throughput sequencing technologies, more and more biologists engage in the study of transcriptome sequencing in evaluation of forage germplasm resources, formation mechanism of important traits, the exploration of excellent genes and molecular marker development. In this paper, the authors have reviewed the current researches on transcriptome of forage plants in term of plant growth and development, adaptation mechanism of biotic and abiotic stress (saline-alkali, extreme temperature, drought, nutrition deficiency and heavy metal), stress transcription factor discovery and molecular marker development. In addition, the future research trend of high-throughput sequencing technologies in forage plants was also prospected.