Abstract
Dirigent-jacalin (D-J) genes belong to the plant chimeric lectin family, and play vital roles in plant growth and resistance to abiotic and biotic stresses. To explore the functions of the D-J family in the growth and development of Moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis), their physicochemical properties, phylogenetic relationships, gene and protein structures, and expression patterns were analyzed in detail. Four putative PeD-J genes were identified in the Moso bamboo genome, and microsynteny and phylogenetic analyses indicated that they represent a new branch in the evolution of plant lectins. PeD-J proteins were found to be composed of a dirigent domain and a jacalin-related lectin domain, each of which contained two different motifs. Multiple sequence alignment and homologous modeling analysis indicated that the three-dimensional structure of the PeD-J proteins was significantly different compared to other plant lectins, primarily due to the tandem dirigent and jacalin domains. We surveyed the upstream putative promoter regions of the PeD-Js and found that they mainly contained cis-acting elements related to hormone and abiotic stress response. An analysis of the expression patterns of root, leaf, rhizome and panicle revealed that four PeD-J genes were highly expressed in the panicle, indicating that they may be required during the formation and development of several different tissue types in Moso bamboo. Moreover, PeD-J genes were shown to be involved in the rapid growth and development of bamboo shoots. Quantitative Real-time PCR (qRT PCR) assays further verified that D-J family genes were responsive to hormones and stresses. The results of this study will help to elucidate the biological functions of PeD-Js during bamboo growth, development and stress response.
Highlights
Moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis) is a major species of woody bamboo that is widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical regions [1]
The plants infiltrated with Agrobacterium tumefaciens were grown for 24 h at 23 ̊C in the dark and for an additional 24–72 h under a 16h light:8h dark cycle, after which the leaves were separated and the green fluorescent protein (GFP) signal was observed under a confocal microscope (Germany, Zeiss, LSM880)
Venn diagram analysis was used to identify four genes that were contained in both lists, which were considered PeD-J genes (S1 Fig)
Summary
Moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis) is a major species of woody bamboo that is widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical regions [1]. Plants have developed numerous sophisticated physiological, cellular and molecular mechanisms, such as disease resistance genes, stress response transcription factors, lectins and a host of other mechanisms to adapt to adverse conditions [11,12,13,14,15] The study of these genes in bamboo will deepen the current understanding of the evolutionary and functional mechanisms of plant adaptation to the environment, which will be beneficial to the improvement of crop genetics. In Gramineae (maize, sorghum, rice, wheat, sugarcane and others), a unique type of chimeric dirigent-jacalin (D-J) lectin is common [39,40,41,42,43,44,45] These genes play essential roles in plants, responding to biotic and abiotic stresses, as well as regulating plant growth and development [46, 47]. We identified four Moso bamboo chimeric D-J lectin genes and investigated the structural domains, expansion patterns and evolutionary relationship among bamboo lectins
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