ScDREB10, an A-5c type of DREB Gene of the Desert Moss Syntrichia caninervis, Confers Osmotic and Salt Tolerances to Arabidopsis.

Xiaoshuang Li,Bei Gao,Andrew J Wood,Tohir A Bozorov,Meiheriguli Mijiti,Yuqing Liang,Honglan Yang,Daoyuan Zhang

doi:10.3390/genes10020146

Abstract

Drought and salinity are major factors limiting crop productivity worldwide. DREB (dehydration-responsive element-binding) transcription factors play important roles in plant stress response and have been identified in a wide variety of plants. Studies on DREB are focused on the A-1 (DREB1) and A-2 (DREB2) groups. Studies on A-5 group DREBs, which represent a large proportion of the DREB subfamily, is limited. In this study, we characterized and analyzed the stress tolerance function of ScDREB10, an A-5c type DREB gene from the desert moss Syntrichia caninervis. Transactivation assay in yeast showed that ScDREB10 had transactivation activity. Transient expression assay revealed that ScDREB10 was distributed both in the nucleus and cytosol of tobacco leaf epidermal cells. Overexpression of ScDREB10 significantly increased the germination percentage of Arabidopsis seeds under osmotic and salt stresses, and improved the osmotic and salt stress tolerances of Arabidopsis at the seedling stage and is associated with the expression of downstream stress-related genes and improved reactive oxygen species (ROS) scavenging ability. Our study provides insight into the molecular mechanism of stress tolerance of A-5 type DREB proteins, as well as providing a promising candidate gene for crop salt and drought stress breeding.

Highlights

Drought and salinity are common abiotic stress factors that seriously affect plant growth and development [1,2]
(APETALA2/ethylene-responsive Element Binding Factor) gene family, which comprises one of the largest group of plant transcription factors and is involved in various plant stress responses [6,7,8,9,10], The DREB genes were originally isolated from Arabidopsis thaliana [11], and in the past two decades of research, DREBs have been widely identified in various plants, such as rice, soybean, maize
DREB group can be divided into three subgroups: A-5a, A-5b, and A-5c based upon motif composition and sequence similarities

Summary

Introduction

Drought and salinity are common abiotic stress factors that seriously affect plant growth and development [1,2]. Drought stress can lead to osmotic stress and oxidative damage, while salt stress primarily imposes osmotic stress and ion toxicity [3]. These stresses can disrupt cellular structure and impair key physiological functions, and in extreme cases, cause plant death [4]. A-1 (DREB1) and A-2 (DREB2) were extensively studied and are considered to be the two main groups of DREBs primarily involved in the regulation of plant abiotic stress response [9,10,11,15,16,17]. A-5 DREBs contains a large number of gene members while are rarely studied

Methods

Results

Conclusion