Identification of drought-responsive microRNAs and their targets in Ammopiptanthus mongolicus by using high-throughput sequencing.

Fei Gao,Huayun Li,Jinchao Feng,Chunxiang Wei,Ning Wang,Jisheng Liu,Yijun Zhou,Zihua Xiao,Chenxi Fu,Xiaoduo Lu

doi:10.1038/srep34601

Fei Gao, Huayun Li + Show 8 more

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https://doi.org/10.1038/srep34601

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Abstract

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) regulate target gene expression to modulate plant growth, development, and biotic and abiotic stress response at the post-transcriptional level. Ammopiptanthus mongolicus, an ecologically important desert plant, is increasingly used as a model for studying stress tolerance in plants. The miRNA-mediated gene regulatory network might remarkably contribute to the high stress tolerance of A. mongolicus. However, a genome-wide identification of miRNAs and their targets is still lacking in A. mongolicus. In this study, 170 conserved and 156 non-conserved miRNAs were identified in A. mongolicus. We experimentally identified 298 miRNA-target pairs from the degradome data. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analyses identified 28 drought-responsive miRNAs in leaves and 15 in roots. Some characteristics of the miRNA-mediated regulatory network were found in A. mongolicus. Multiple miRNAs, including 2 newly identified non-conserved miRNAs, miR-P11 and miR-P14, generated from the precursors of miR169, were found to be involved in drought stress response. Further, miR2118 and miR858 participated in drought stress response by up-regulating OZF1 gene and certain MYB genes that were involved in the regulation of flavonol biosynthesis in A. mongolicus. The findings of this study might provide new insights for understanding the functions of miRNA in stress response in plants.

Highlights

MicroRNAs regulate target gene expression to modulate plant growth, development, and biotic and abiotic stress response at the post-transcriptional level
More attention needs to be paid to the nucleotide-binding site leucine-rich repeat (NBS-LRR) domain-containing disease resistance protein gene targets of miR2118 in other plant species, the activation of the expression of OZF1 by miR2118 might play a crucial role in drought response of A. mongolicus
High-throughput sequencing technology has been used extensively to identify plant miRNAs and abiotic stress-responsive miRNAs, and these studies have greatly advanced the understanding of the biological roles of miRNAs in stress response

Summary

Introduction

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) regulate target gene expression to modulate plant growth, development, and biotic and abiotic stress response at the post-transcriptional level. Numerous studies have shown that plant miRNAs are involved in the regulation of drought response[8,9], and many miRNAs were shown to be responsive to drought stress in plants such as Arabidopsis[10], rice[11], maize[12], barley[13], wheat, cotton[14], and barrel medic[15] These results remarkably advanced our understanding on the biological www.nature.com/scientificreports/. A batch of putative stress tolerance-related genes were isolated and characterized[18,19,20], and transcriptome analyses of drought and cold stress responses were conducted using next-generation sequencing technology in A. mongolicus[17,21,22,23] These studies advanced our knowledge regarding the molecular genetic mechanisms underlying the drought stress response in A. mongolicus and provided numerous transcriptome sequences

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