Regulation of Plastid Gene Expression by High Temperature during Light Induced Chloroplast Development

Abstract

Effect of high temperature on the plastid gene expression during the light induced chloroplast development in etiolated seedlings was determined by Northern hybridisation using cloned DNA fragments of wheat chloroplast genome. Based on their response to high temperature, plastid genes were grouped into three categories: (1) plastid genes whose expression was not affected by high temperature (genes for rRNA, ribosomal proteins, tRNAs, and some genes coding for putative NADH dehydrogenase); (2) plastid genes whose expression increased at high temperature (genes coding for α-subunit of RNA polymerase and some unidentified transcripts, and (3) plastid genes whose expression decreased at high temperature (genes coding for proteins involved in photosynthetic process). Loss of a number of primary transcripts originating from operons consisting of genes that code for proteins involved in the photosynthetic process was observed. The expression of all the light inducible plastid genes was inhibited suggesting that the light inducibility property was lost at high temperature.