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Phenotyping soybean plants transformed with rd29A:AtDREB1A for drought tolerance in the greenhouse and field

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Abstract

The development of drought tolerant plants is a high priority because the area suffering from drought is expected to increase in the future due to global warming. One strategy for the development of drought tolerance is to genetically engineer plants with transcription factors (TFs) that regulate the expression of several genes related to abiotic stress defense responses. This work assessed the performance of soybean plants overexpressing the TF DREB1A under drought conditions in the field and in the greenhouse. Drought was simulated in the greenhouse by progressively drying the soil of pot cultures of the P58 and P1142 lines. In the field, the performance of the P58 line and of 09D-0077, a cross between the cultivars BR16 and P58, was evaluated under four different water regimes: irrigation, natural drought (no irrigation) and water stress created using rain-out shelters in the vegetative or reproductive stages. Although the dehydration-responsive element-binding protein (DREB) plants did not outperform the cultivar BR16 in terms of yield, some yield components were increased when drought was introduced during the vegetative stage, such as the number of seeds, the number of pods with seeds and the total number of pods. The greenhouse data suggest that the higher survival rates of DREB plants are because of lower water use due to lower transpiration rates under well watered conditions. Further studies are needed to better characterize the soil and atmospheric conditions under which these plants may outperform the non-transformed parental plants.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Science and Technology Research Partnership for Sustainable Development (SATREPS) of the Japan Science and Technology Agency/Japan International Cooperation Agency, JIRCAS, Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária, Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), Londrina State University (UEL)/Brazil.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of General Biology, Londrina State University, Rodovia Celso Garcia Cid, PR 445, Km 380, P.O. Box 6001, Londrina, 86051-990, Brazil

    Amanda Alves de Paiva Rolla & Cibelle Engels

  2. EMBRAPA Soybean, Rodovia Carlos João Strass, Distrito de Warta, P.O. Box 231, Londrina, 86001-970, Brazil

    Josirley de Fátima Corrêa Carvalho, Renata Fuganti-Pagliarini, Alexandre do Rio, Silvana Regina Rockenbach Marin, Maria Cristina Neves de Oliveira, Francismar Corrêa Marcelino-Guimarães, José Renato Bouças Farias, Norman Neumaier & Alexandre Lima Nepomuceno

  3. Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Av. Paulo Gama, 110, Porto Alegre, 90040-060, Brazil

    Magda A. Beneventi

  4. Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-8686, Japan

    Kazuo Nakashima

  5. Laboratory of Plant Molecular Physiology, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo, 1-1-1 Yayoi, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8657, Japan

    Kazuko Yamaguchi-Shinozaki

  6. LABEX USA Plant Biotechnology - SRI - EMBRAPA - MAPA – BRAZIL Plant Gene Expression Center - ARS - USDA – USA, 800 Buchanan St., Albany, CA, 94710, USA

    Alexandre Lima Nepomuceno

Authors
  1. Amanda Alves de Paiva Rolla
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  2. Josirley de Fátima Corrêa Carvalho
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  3. Renata Fuganti-Pagliarini
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  5. Alexandre do Rio
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  6. Silvana Regina Rockenbach Marin
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  7. Maria Cristina Neves de Oliveira
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  8. Magda A. Beneventi
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  9. Francismar Corrêa Marcelino-Guimarães
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  10. José Renato Bouças Farias
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  11. Norman Neumaier
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  12. Kazuo Nakashima
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  13. Kazuko Yamaguchi-Shinozaki
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  14. Alexandre Lima Nepomuceno
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alexandre Lima Nepomuceno.

Additional information

Communicated by: Amanda Alves de Paiva Rolla.

Josirley de Fátima Corrêa Carvalho and Amanda Alves de Paiva Rolla made equal contributions to this paper.

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de Paiva Rolla, A.A., de Fátima Corrêa Carvalho, J., Fuganti-Pagliarini, R. et al. Phenotyping soybean plants transformed with rd29A:AtDREB1A for drought tolerance in the greenhouse and field. Transgenic Res 23, 75–87 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11248-013-9723-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11248-013-9723-6

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