Fig. 5

The expression fold change of selected candidate defense hub genes determined by quantitative real time PCR (a) and by RNA sequencing (b). For qRT-PCR, the expression level of Triticum turgidum ssp. carthlicum Blackbird (BB), durum wheat cv. Strongfield (SF), and doubled haploid lines from the SF/BB population with transgressive resistant (R) and susceptible (S) inoculated with Fusarium graminearum was reported as expression fold change relative to mock inoculated samples. QRT-PCR data were normalized using α-tubulin gene expression as a reference gene. The expression ratio of same samples from RNA-sequencing was calculated by dividing the normalized read counts of the inoculated to the average read counts of mock-inoculated samples. Errors bars show the standard deviation of the means. The candidate hub genes encode heat stress transcription factor A-2a (HSFA2A), putative late blight resistance R1C-3 (R1C-3), G-type lectin S-receptor-like serine/threonine-protein kinase SRK (SRK), heat shock cognate 70 kDa protein 2 (HSC-2) and serine/threonine-protein kinase PCRK1 (PCRK1)