RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access

Identification of expressed resistance gene-like sequences by data mining in 454-derived transcriptomic sequences of common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) Zhanji Liu1,2,5*, Mollee Crampton3,6, Antonette Todd1 and Venu Kalavacharla1,4* Background: Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) is one of the most important legumes in the world. Several diseases severely reduce bean production and quality; therefore, it is very important to better understand disease resistance in common bean in order to prevent these losses. More than 70 resistance (R) genes which confer resistance against various pathogens have been cloned from diverse plant species. Most R genes share highly conserved domains which facilitates the identification of new candidate R genes from the same species or other species. The goals of this study were to isolate expressed R gene-like sequences (RGLs) from 454-derived transcriptomic sequences and expressed sequence tags (ESTs) of common bean, and to develop RGL-tagged molecular markers. Results: A data-mining approach was used to identify tentative P. vulgaris R gene-like sequences fro