Abstract
Plant adaptation to abiotic stress is significantly influenced by galactinol synthase (GolS), which is a regulatory enzyme that catalyzes the synthesis of raffinose family oligosaccharides (RFOs). Soybean GolS genes, GmGolS2-1 and GmGolS2-2 were isolated in this study. GmGolS2-1 was 993 bp and encoded a 330-amino acid polypeptide, and GmGolS2-2 was 975 bp and encoded a 324-amino acid polypeptide. The deduced amino acid sequences contained common features of plant GolS proteins: a DXD motif and a hydrophobic pentapeptide (APSAA). Significant increase of GmGolS2-1 and GmGolS2-2 transcripts under drought stress was observed under real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR (qPCR), while their transcripts only increased slightly under salt and cold stresses. The GmGolS2-1 promoter region contained four methyl jasmonate-responsive elements, two anaerobic-induced elements, a wound-responsive element, and two MYB binding sites. Overexpression of GmGolS2-1 enhanced the GolS activity along with expression of stress-associated genes in transgenic tobacco. Additionally, the overexpression of GmGolS2-1 resulted in lower relative electrolyte leakage and malondialdehyde (MDA) content and higher soluble carbohydrates and proline content in transgenic tobacco than wild-type (WT) tobacco under drought stress. These findings indicate that GmGolS2-1 improved transgenic tobacco drought resistance.
Key message
Two galactinol synthase genes, GmGolS2-1 andGmGolS2-1, were isolated from soybean. They could be induced by abiotic stress. GmGolS2-1 enhances tolerance to drought in transgenic tobacco.
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Abbreviations
- GolS:
-
Galactinol synthase
- MDA:
-
Malondialdehyde
- ORF:
-
Open reading frame
- PCR:
-
Polymerase chain reaction
- PEG:
-
Polyethylene glycol
- qPCR:
-
Quantitative real-time PCR
- RFOs:
-
Raffinose family oligosaccharides
- ROS:
-
Reactive oxygen species
- WT:
-
Wild-type
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Training Plan of Young Creative Talents of Average Four-year College of Heilongjiang (Grant No. UNPYSCT-2017153), the Fundamental Research Funds in Heilongjiang Provincial Universities (Special Subject of Plant Food Processing Technology) (Grant No. YSTSXK201878) and the Innovative Research Project for Graduate Students of Qiqihar University (Grant No. YJSCX2019050).
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Conceived and designed the experiments: YZ. Performed the experiments: SQ, JZ, JH, ML, WS, and YZ. The first draft of the manuscript was written by SQ and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Communicated by: Francisco de Assis Alves Mourão Filho.
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Qiu, S., Zhang, J., He, J. et al. Overexpression of GmGolS2-1, a soybean galactinol synthase gene, enhances transgenic tobacco drought tolerance. Plant Cell Tiss Organ Cult 143, 507–516 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11240-020-01936-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11240-020-01936-w