Expression landscape and allelic imbalance expression of desiccation tolerance–related genes under desiccation stress. (A) Clustering of expression profiles of genes that may be related to nematode resistance to desiccation stress at different developmental stages and under different desiccation stressors showed that these genes had significantly different expression patterns under desiccation stress, normal growth, and cold stress. (B–G) The alleles of genes associated with desiccation stress response were expressed in an unbalanced manner under different desiccation stress conditions, whereas these genes did not exhibit such unbalanced expression under cold stress. Nematodes may use specific gene regulatory mechanisms to enhance fitness. Bars represent mean values ± SD. P values for the entire data set were calculated using two-way ANOVA, whereas P values for the cold condition were calculated using a two-tailed unpaired Student's t-test. (ns) no significant difference.
