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Overexpression of the trehalose-6-phosphate synthase gene OsTPS1 enhances abiotic stress tolerance in rice

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Abstract

Trehalose plays an important role in metabolic regulation and abiotic stress tolerance in a variety of organisms. In plants, its biosynthesis is catalyzed by two key enzymes: trehalose-6-phosphate synthase (TPS) and trehalose-6-phosphate phosphatase (TPP). The genome of rice (Oryza sativa) contains 11 OsTPS genes, and only OsTPS1 shows TPS activity. To demonstrate the physiological function of OsTPS1, we introduced it into rice and found that OsTPS1 overexpression improved the tolerance of rice seedling to cold, high salinity and drought treatments without other significant phenotypic changes. In transgenic lines overexpressing OsTPS1, trehalose and proline concentrations were higher than in the wild type and some stress-related genes were up-regulated, including WSI18, RAB16C, HSP70, and ELIP. These results demonstrate that OsTPS1 may enhance the abiotic stress tolerance of plants by increasing the amount of trehalose and proline, and regulating the expression of stress-related genes. Furthermore, we found that overexpression of some Class II TPSs also enhanced plant tolerance of abiotic stress. This work will help to clarify the role of trehalose metabolism in abiotic stress response in higher plants.

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Abbreviations

ABA:

Abscisic acid

CaMV:

Cauliflower mosaic virus

FW:

Fresh weight

HPIC:

High-performance ion chromatography

RT-PCR:

Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction

T-6-P:

Trehalose-6-phosphate

TPP:

Trehalose-6-phosphate phosphatase

TPS:

Trehalose-6-phosphate synthase

WT:

Wild type

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by grants from the Agricultural Ministry of China (2008ZX08009-003), the 863 High-tech Project from the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (2007AA10Z185), and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (2010 No. 31071378).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Gene Engineering Drug and Biotechnology, Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Regulation of Ministry of Education, College of Life Sciences, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, People’s Republic of China

    Hao-Wen Li & Xi-Ping Wang

  2. Peking-Yale Joint Center of Plant Molecular Genetics and Agrobiotechnology, College of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, 100871, People’s Republic of China

    Bai-Sheng Zang & Xing-Wang Deng

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  1. Hao-Wen Li
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  2. Bai-Sheng Zang
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  3. Xing-Wang Deng
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  4. Xi-Ping Wang
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Correspondence to Xi-Ping Wang.

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425_2011_1458_MOESM3_ESM.tif

Online Resource 3 Architecture analysis of different TPS1 proteins. a The protein features of TPShomologues were analyzed using SMART (Schultz et al. 1998). The TPS domains (Pfam: Glyco_transf_20) are indicated by white rectangles. The TPP domains (Pfam: Trehalose_PPase) are indicated by gray rectangles. b Sequence alignment of EcotsA (E. coli, P31677), ScTPS1 (S. cerevisiae, Q00764), SlTPS1 (S. lepidophylla, Q9ZR75), AtTPS1 (A. thaliana, Q9SYM4) and OsTPS1 (O. sativa, HM050424). A black background indicates amino acid residues which are completely identical. A gray background depicted conserved amino acid residues which are identical in at least three of the protein sequences (TIFF 7.33 mb)

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Li, HW., Zang, BS., Deng, XW. et al. Overexpression of the trehalose-6-phosphate synthase gene OsTPS1 enhances abiotic stress tolerance in rice. Planta 234, 1007–1018 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-011-1458-0

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