Soybean (Glycine max L. Merril) crop is major source of edible oil and protein for human and animals besides its various industrial uses including biofuels. Phytoplasma induced floral bud distortion syndrome (FBD), also known as witches’ broom syndrome (WBS) has been one of the major biotic stresses adversely affecting its productivity. Transcriptomic approach can be used for knowledge discovery of this disease manifestation by morpho-physiological key pathways. We report transcriptomic study using Illumina HiSeq NGS data of FBD in soybean, revealing 17,454 differentially expressed genes, 5561 transcription factors, 139 pathways and 176,029 genic region putative markers single sequence repeats, single nucleotide polymorphism and Insertion Deletion. Roles of PmbA, Zn-dependent protease, SAP family and auxin responsive system are described revealing mechanism of flower bud distortion having abnormalities in pollen, stigma development. Validation of 10 randomly selected genes was done by qPCR. Our findings describe the basic mechanism of FBD disease, right from sensing of phytoplasma infection by host plant triggering molecular signalling leading to mobilization of carbohydrate and protein, phyllody, abnormal pollen development, improved colonization of insect in host plants to spread the disease. Study reveals how phytoplasma hijacks metabolic machinery of soybean manifesting FBD. This is the first report of transcriptomic signature of FBD or WBS disease of soybean revealing morphological and metabolic changes which attracts insect for spread of disease. All the genic region putative markers may be used as genomic resource for variety improvement and new agro-chemical development for disease control to enhance soybean productivity.

An efficient and reproducible plant regeneration procedure is essential for introducing genes of interest in important crops through genetic transformation. However, some crops, such as soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill), are difficult to manipulate in vitro, often depending on their genotype, and the reproduction of the established protocols is not always possible. The purpose of this paper is the optimization of a regeneration protocol for soybean shoots of the Indian variety JS-335 to enable its reproduction. Four explants viz, Cotyledonary node, embryo, half seed and hypocotyl were tested using various combinations and concentrations of growth hormones. The effect of several concentrations of 2,4-D and BAP was effective in initiating Callogenesis in three types of explants though concentration varied widely. The highest callogenesis of 82.93% were recorded on 14^th day using half seed explant. However, the highest shoot induction of 93.79% with multiple numbers of shoots was recorded using cotyledonary node explant inoculated on the medium fortified with 5.0 mg.L⁻¹ BAP.