Abstract

Chloroplast genome of the seven members of the family solanaceae – Nicotiana tabacum, N. sylvestris, N. tomentosiformis, N. undulate, Solanum tuberosum, S. lycopersicum, and S. bulbocastanum were extracted from NCBI Gene Bank and were subjected to the bioinformatics study. In this study we found that the genes and amino acid sequences in the proteins were almost identical and conserved. Even the structure and sequences of introns were more or less conserved. Certain variations were observed in the nature and occurrence of open reading frames, which may be due to species specific genome. Some variations were also observed when compared these dicot genomes with the monocot genome of rice. But in contrast to some primitive species such as members of cryptophyta, there were fewer numbers of genes which may be due to the transfer of some chloroplast genes into the nuclear genome.

Key words: Solanaceae, Nicotiana, Solanum, Chloroplast genome, GenBank, Comparative analysis.