Transcription of the WUSCHEL-RELATED HOMEOBOX 4 gene in Arabidopsis thaliana

Abstract

Phylogenetic shadowing and chromatin accessibility data suggested that essential regulatory elements are absent in the 2.9 kb immediate upstream region of the published WOX4pro::YFP cambium marker. Inclusion of an additional 6.3 kb of upstream promoter sequence and confocal imaging with different fluorophores in transgenic Arabidopsis lines revealed a much wider cell-type-specific expression pattern in parenchymous cells of the aerial plant body. The previously demonstrated activity of the WOX4pro::YFP marker in the cambium of vascular strands in the young Arabidopsis inflorescence stem depicts only sectors of a circular subcortical layer of parenchymous AtWOX4-positive cells. Transcription starts in subepidermal cells within the inflorescence apex in a phyllotactic pattern and extends into successively branching lateral organs, which are connected via small tube-like domains of AtWOX4-expressing cells with the circular subcortical parenchymal layer that extends basipetally down the stem. AtWOX4 expression is most dynamic in leaves, where promoter activity is observed transiently at the adaxial side of the lamina and remains detectable later in the palisade parenchyma, although at a weaker level than in the vasculature. In the root the extended AtWOX4 promoter is active through the proximal root meristem, i.e. in the quiescent centre (QC) and its surrounding initials, a pattern that is broader than transcription of its stem cell promoting relative AtWOX5 in the QC. Outside the proximal meristem AtWOX4 transcription is observed in upper cell layers of the columella root cap beneath or above within the stele in proto- and metaxylem cells, in a ribbon-type pattern which divides the central cylinder in two equal halves. This xylem-specific expression it the root stele relates to established AtWOX4 activity in xylem parenchyma specificity within vascular bundles of the stem.