Abstract
Arabidopsis is used as a model species in numerous physiological and genetic studies. Most of them employ parafilm-wrapped sterile culture. Here we demonstrate that this method is prone to potential artifacts and can lead to erroneous conclusions. We compared the effect of different sealing methods including air-permeable paper tape and traditional parafilm on Arabidopsis seedling growth, root development and gene expression network. Although seedlings grown in Petri dishes after 1 week sealed with paper tape showed a similar growth phenotype to that of parafilm-sealed seedlings, more than 700 differentially expressed genes (DEG) were found, including stress and nutrition-responsive genes. In addition, more H2O2 was accumulated in the tissues of parafilm-sealed plants. After 14 days of growth, paper tape-sealed plants grew much better than parafilm-sealed ones and accumulated higher chlorophyll content, with 490 DEGs found. After 3 weeks of growth, paper tape-sealed plants had higher chlorophyll and better growth compared to parafilm-sealed ones; and only 10 DEGs were found at this stage. Thus, the obvious phenotype observed at the latter stage was a result of differential gene expression at earlier time points, mostly of defense, abiotic stress, nutrition, and phytohormone-responsive genes. More O2 content was detected inside paper tape-sealed Petri dishes at early growth stage (7 days), and distinct difference in the CO2 content was observed between parafilm-sealed and paper tape-sealed Petri dishes. Furthermore, the carbon source also influenced seedlings growth with different sealing methods. In conclusion, conventional sealing using parafilm was not the optimal choice, most likely because of the limited gas exchange and a consequent stress caused to plants.
Highlights
Arabidopsis thaliana belongs to the Cruciferae and is known as a “plant fly” due to its broad use in genetic studies and the fast growth cycle, simple morphological characteristics, as well as strong vitality
Parafilm was purchased from Parafilm M Laboratory Film, and the paper tape was from 3M Yuwell company (China)
Effects of Different Sealing Methods on the Growth of Arabidopsis thaliana The growth rate, fresh weight, chlorophyll content, and root length were similar between 7-day-old parafilm-sealed and paper tape-sealed seedlings
Summary
Arabidopsis thaliana belongs to the Cruciferae and is known as a “plant fly” due to its broad use in genetic studies and the fast growth cycle, simple morphological characteristics, as well as strong vitality. Parafilm-Sealing Posed Stress for Arabidopsis thaliana research in botany can help deepen the understanding of other plants and improve the application of Arabidopsis to important crops (Meinke et al, 1998; Eckardt, 2001). Because of the short cycle and sensitivity to various stimuli, many researchers choose sterile culture to study seed germination rates and response to phytohormones or other chemical substances (Thorpe, 2006), as well as use Petri dishgrown plants to study mechanisms of tolerance to a broad range of abiotic stresses such as salinity or heavy metal toxicity
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