Abstract
BackgroundTransmembrane receptor kinases play critical roles in both animal and plant signaling pathways regulating growth, development, differentiation, cell death, and pathogenic defense responses. In Arabidopsis thaliana, there are at least 223 Leucine-rich repeat receptor-like kinases (LRR-RLKs), representing one of the largest protein families. Although functional roles for a handful of LRR-RLKs have been revealed, the functions of the majority of members in this protein family have not been elucidated.ResultsAs a resource for the in-depth analysis of this important protein family, the complementary DNA sequences (cDNAs) of 194 LRR-RLKs were cloned into the GatewayR donor vector pDONR/ZeoR and analyzed by DNA sequencing. Among them, 157 clones showed sequences identical to the predictions in the Arabidopsis sequence resource, TAIR8. The other 37 cDNAs showed gene structures distinct from the predictions of TAIR8, which was mainly caused by alternative splicing of pre-mRNA. Most of the genes have been further cloned into GatewayR destination vectors with GFP or FLAG epitope tags and have been transformed into Arabidopsis for in planta functional analysis. All clones from this study have been submitted to the Arabidopsis Biological Resource Center (ABRC) at Ohio State University for full accessibility by the Arabidopsis research community.ConclusionsMost of the Arabidopsis LRR-RLK genes have been isolated and the sequence analysis showed a number of alternatively spliced variants. The generated resources, including cDNA entry clones, expression constructs and transgenic plants, will facilitate further functional analysis of the members of this important gene family.
Highlights
Transmembrane receptor kinases play critical roles in both animal and plant signaling pathways regulating growth, development, differentiation, cell death, and pathogenic defense responses
The results suggest that the generated destination vectors are fully functional and can be used for cloning and overexpression of all Leucinerich repeat (LRR)-receptorlike protein kinases (RLKs) in Arabidopsis plants for future functional analyses
Phylogenetic analysis in this study indicated that several subfamilies, such as LRR XII whose members fell into two different subfamilies based on the phylogeny of full length amino acid sequence, could be rearranged to aim future functional analysis of their gene members
Summary
Transmembrane receptor kinases play critical roles in both animal and plant signaling pathways regulating growth, development, differentiation, cell death, and pathogenic defense responses. One of the most important groups of cell surface receptors, the receptorlike protein kinases (RLKs), has unique structural features that make them suitable for cell-to-cell signaling. A small number of RLKs have been functionally characterized in plants and a few specific ligands have been identified. They play essential roles in plant growth, development, pathogen resistance and cell death [2,3,4,5,6,7,8]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
