Gene expression profiling in control, heat-shock, and recovery treatment in a RIL population of Caenorhabditis elegans L4 larvae

This experiment investigates the genetic architecture of gene expression (eQTL) in three different treatments in a N2xCB4856 RIL population of Caenorhabditis elegans. The goal is to identify genetic variation linked to differences in gene expression. We exposed 48 RILs per treatment to a control, heat-stress, and recovery treatment. More specifically these three conditions can be characterized as: (i) the control treatment was grown for 48 hours at 20C, (ii) the heat-stress treatment was grown for 46 hours at 20C followed by 2 hours at 35C, and (iii) the recovery treatment was grown for 46 hours at 20C, followed by 2 hours at 35C and thereafter 2 hours at 20C. Thereafter RNA was isolated, labelled and hybridized on microarray. The gene expression profiles were used for eQTL mapping.