PePYL4 enhances drought tolerance by modulating water use efficiency and ROS scavenging in Populus.
Qing LiChao ShenYue ZhangYangyan ZhouMengxue NiuHou-Ling WangConglong LianQianqian TianWei MaoXiaofei WangChao LiuWeilun YinXin-Li XiaPublished in: Tree physiology (2022)
Drought is one of the major limiting factors in the growth of terrestrial plants. ABA and PYR/PYL/RCARs play a key role in response to drought stress. However, the underlying mechanisms of this control remain largely elusive in trees. In this study, PePYL4, a potential ortholog of the PYR/PYL/RCARs gene, was cloned from Populus euphratica. It was localized in the cytoplasm and nucleus, induced by ABA, osmotic, and dehydration treatments. To study the potential biological functions of PePYL4, transgenic triploid white poplars (Populus tomentosa) overexpressing PePYL4 were generated. PePYL4 overexpression significantly increased ABA sensitivity and reduced stomatal aperture. Compared with wild type plants, transgenic plants had higher water use efficiency (WUE) and lower transpiration. When exposed to drought stress, PePYL4 overexpression plants maintained higher photosynthetic activity and accumulated more biomass. Moreover, overexpression of PePYL4 improved antioxidant enzyme activity and ascorbate content to accelerate reactive oxygen species scavenging. Meanwhile, up-regulation expression of the stress-related genes also contributed to improving the drought tolerance of transgenic plants. In conclusion, our data suggest that PePYL4 is a promising gene target for regulating WUE and drought tolerance in Populus.
Keyphrases
- arabidopsis thaliana
- transcription factor
- reactive oxygen species
- climate change
- cell proliferation
- heat stress
- wild type
- copy number
- genome wide
- poor prognosis
- oxidative stress
- plant growth
- dna damage
- gene expression
- signaling pathway
- big data
- genome wide identification
- deep learning
- artificial intelligence
- long non coding rna
- binding protein