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Identification and expression analysis of the SWEET genes in radish reveal their potential functions in reproductive organ development

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Abstract

Background

Sugars produced by photosynthesis provide energy for biological activities and the skeletons for macromolecules; they also perform multiple physiological functions in plants. Sugar transport across plasma membranes mediated by the Sugar Will Eventually be Exported Transporter (SWEET) genes substantially affects these processes. However, the evolutionary dynamics and function of the SWEET genes are largely unknown in radish, an important Brassicaceae species.

Methods and results

Genome-wide identification and analysis of the RsSWEET genes from the recently updated radish reference genome was conducted using bioinformatics methods. The tissue-specific expression was analyzed using public RNA-seq data, and the expression levels in the bud, stamens, pistils, pericarps and seeds at 15 and 30 days after flowering (DAF) were determined by RT‒qPCR. Thirty-seven RsSWEET genes were identified and named according to their Arabidopsis homologous. They are unevenly distributed across the nine radish chromosomes and were further divided into four clades by phylogenetic analysis. There are 5–7 transmembrane domains and at least one MtN3_slv domain in the RsSWEETs. RNA-seq and RT‒qPCR revealed that the RsSWEETs exhibit higher expression levels in the reproductive organs, indicating that these genes might play vital roles in reproductive organ development. RsSWEET15.1 was found to be especially expressed in siliques according to the RNA-seq data, and the RT‒qPCR results further confirmed that it was most highly expressed levels in the seeds at 30 DAF, followed by the pericarp at 15 DAF, indicating that it is involved in seed growth and development.

Conclusions

This study suggests that the RsSWEET genes play vital roles in reproductive organ development and provides a theoretical basis for the future functional analysis of RsSWEETs in radish.

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Data availability

The R. sativus ‘Xin-li-mei’ whole-genome sequence was downloaded from the CNCB database with accession number GWHANWD00000000 (https://ngdc.cncb.ac.cn/gwh/Assembly/9797/show). The RNA-seq reads in different tissues (root, leaf, bolting tissue, flower, silique and callus) of R. sativus are available at the NCBI Sequence Read Archive (SRA, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Traces/sra) (PRJNA413464).

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Funding

This study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31801858); Research Foundation Incubation Project of Jinling Institute of Technology (jit-fhxm-202113); and Research Foundation for Talented Scholars of Jinling Institute of Technology (jit-b-202009).

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  1. Tongjin Liu and Qunxiang Cui have contributed equally to this research.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Horticulture, Jinling Institute of Technology, Nanjing, 210038, China

    Tongjin Liu, Qunxiang Cui, Qiuyan Ban, Lu Zhou, Yinghui Yuan, Aihui Zhang, Qian Wang & Changyi Wang

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  1. Tongjin Liu
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Contributions

TL: Methodology, Investigation, Formal analysis, Writing-original draft, review & revision, Software, Funding acquisition. QC: Methodology, Analysis, Validation, Writing-original draft. QB: Investigation. LZ: Resources. YY: Investigation. AZ: Investigation. QW: Daily management. CW: Conceptualization, Investigation, Supervision, Project administration.

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Correspondence to Tongjin Liu or Changyi Wang.

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Supplementary Information

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Supplementary file1 (PDF 99 KB)—Amino acid sequences of the SWEETs from the 7 species used in the present study

11033_2023_8701_MOESM2_ESM.tif

Supplementary file2 (TIF 1778 KB)—Multiple sequence alignment of the SWEET proteins in radish and A. thaliana SWEET1. The seven TM domains were assigned based on the AtSWEET1 structure indicated by Tao et al. (2015)

Supplementary file3 (XLSX 12 KB)—Primers used for RT‒qPCR

Supplementary file4 (XLSX 13 KB)—SWEET genes identified in R. sativus and corresponding physicochemical properties

Supplementary file5 (DOCX 16 KB)—Conserved motifs identified among the radish SWEET proteins

11033_2023_8701_MOESM6_ESM.xlsx

Supplementary file6 (XLSX 12 KB)—The fragments per kilobase of transcript per million mapped reads (FPKM) values of the radish SWEET genes in various organs based on RNA-seq data

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Liu, T., Cui, Q., Ban, Q. et al. Identification and expression analysis of the SWEET genes in radish reveal their potential functions in reproductive organ development. Mol Biol Rep 50, 7535–7546 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-023-08701-0

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