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Chinese chestnut (<i>Castanea mollissima</i> Blume) can be infested by <i>Dryocosmus kuriphilus</i> Yasumatsu, resulting in gall formation and yield losses. Research on the control of gall wasps using genomics approaches is rarely reported. We used RNA-seq to investigate the dynamic changes in the genes of a chestnut species (<i>C. mollissima</i> B.) during four gall-formation stages caused by <i>D. kuriphilus</i>. A total of 21,306 genes were annotated by BLAST in databases. Transcriptome comparison between different gall-formation stages revealed many genes that were differentially expressed compared to the control. Among these, 2410, 7373, 6294, and 9412 genes were differentially expressed in four gall-formation stages: initiation stage (A), early growth stage (B), late growth stage (C), and maturation stage (D), respectively. Annotation analysis indicated that many metabolic processes (e.g., phenylpropanoid biosynthesis, secondary metabolism, plant&#8315;pathogen interaction) were affected. Interesting genes encoding putative components of signal transduction, stress response, and transcription factors were also differentially regulated. These genes might play important roles in response to <i>D. kuriphilus</i> gall formation. These new data on the mechanism by which <i>D. kuriphilus</i> infests chestnuts could help improve chestnut resistance.