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Transcriptome analysis revealed cadmium accumulation mechanisms in hyperaccumulator Siegesbeckia orientalis L.

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Abstract

Siegesbeckia orientalis L. was identified as a novel Cd-hyperaccumulator and valuable phytoremediation material. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying Cd accumulation in S. orientalis are largely unknown. In this study, RNA-Seq analysis was performed to study the Cd-accumulating mechanisms in its roots with or without Cd treatment. The RNA-seq analysis generated 312 million pairs of clean reads and 78G sequencing data. De novo transcriptome assembly produced 355,070 transcripts with an average length of 823.59 bp and 194,207 unigenes with an average length of 605.68 bp. Comparative transcriptome analyses identified a large number of differentially expressed genes in roots under Cd stress, and functional annotation suggested that S. orientalis utilizes various biological pathways involving many gene networks working simultaneously to cope with the stress. This study revealed that four biological pathways were mainly involved in S. orientalis tolerance to Cd stress, including reactive oxygen species scavenging, phenylpropanoid biosynthesis pathway, Cd absorption and transport, and ABA signaling pathway. The genes related to photosynthesis and heavy metal transport are likely the potential candidates and could be further investigated to determine their roles in Cd tolerance in S. orientalis roots. These findings will be useful to understand the Cd accumulation mechanisms in S. orientalis and facilitate the study of phytoremediation at the molecular level in plants.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by The Key Research and Development Projects of Sichuan Province, China (No. 2019YFN0020) and The Science and Technology Project for Sichuan Environmental Protection (No. 2018HB30). We thank Zhien Pu, Zhongxu Chen, Peng Liu, Yulan Deng, and Yuanyuan Dong of Sichuan Agricultural University for supporting the transcriptome analysis and assisting with the research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Environment Sciences, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, 611130, China

    Xiaoxun Xu, Shirong Zhang, Zhang Cheng, Guiyin Wang, Zhanbiao Yang, Junren Xian & Yuanxiang Yang

  2. Key Laboratory of Soil Environment Protection of Sichuan Province, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, 611130, China

    Xiaoxun Xu, Shirong Zhang & Guiyin Wang

  3. College of Resources, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, 611130, China

    Ting Li, Yongxia Jia & Wei Zhou

Authors
  1. Xiaoxun Xu
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  2. Shirong Zhang
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  3. Zhang Cheng
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  4. Ting Li
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  5. Yongxia Jia
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  6. Guiyin Wang
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  8. Junren Xian
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  9. Yuanxiang Yang
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  10. Wei Zhou
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Contributions

XX and SZ conceived the study and designed the experiments. SZ supervised the research, acquired funding, and revised the manuscript. XX, ZC, TL, YJ, and GW performed the experiments and analyzed the data; XX, ZY, JX, YY, and WZ cultivated and prepared the plant materials; and XX wrote the manuscript. All of the authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Shirong Zhang.

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Responsible editor: Gangrong Shi

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Xu, X., Zhang, S., Cheng, Z. et al. Transcriptome analysis revealed cadmium accumulation mechanisms in hyperaccumulator Siegesbeckia orientalis L.. Environ Sci Pollut Res 27, 18853–18865 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-08387-y

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