A plant-specific tau class glutathione S-transferase from Oryza sativa with very high activity against 1-chloro-2,4-dinitrobenzene and chloroacetanilide herbicides

Abstract

A plant-specific tau class GST gene homolog was successfully cloned from an Oryza sativa cDNA library by PCR using oligonucleotide primers based on the OsGSTU4 (GenBank Accession No. AF309378) sequence. The cDNA was composed of a 720-bp open reading frame encoding 239 amino acids. The deduced amino acid sequence of this gene shared over 65% sequence identity with the sequences of the tau class TaGST28e45 and ZmGST42. Conversely, the OsGSTU4 sequence showed very low identity to the GST sequences of phi, theta and zeta classes. This gene was expressed in Escherichia coli with the pET vector system, and the gene product was purified to homogeneity using GSH–Sepharose affinity column chromatography. The expressed OsGSTU4 formed a homodimer with subunits of approximately 25.5 kDa. OsGSTU4 displayed very high activity toward 1-chloro-2,4-dinitrobenzene. The activity of the OsGSTU4 was significantly inhibited by S-hexylglutathione and hematin. Plant OsGSTU4 had a unique herbicide specificity and played an important role in the detoxification reaction against fluorodifen and chloroacetanilide herbicides.