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QNE1 is a key flowering regulator determining the length of the vegetative period in soybean cultivars

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Abstract

The soybean E1 gene is a major regulator that plays an important role in flowering time and maturity. However, it remains unclear how cultivars carrying the dominant E1 allele adapt to the higher latitudinal areas of northern China. We mapped the novel quantitative trait locus QNE1 (QTL near E1) for flowering time to the region proximal to E1 on chromosome 6 in two mapping populations. Positional cloning revealed Glyma.06G204300, encoding a TCP-type transcription factor, as a strong candidate gene for QNE1. Association analysis further confirmed that functional single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) at nucleotides 686 and 1,063 in the coding region of Glyma.06G204300 were significantly associated with flowering time. The protein encoded by the candidate gene is localized primarily to the nucleus. Furthermore, soybean and Brassica napus plants overexpressing Glyma.06G204300 exhibited early flowering. We conclude that despite their similar effects on flowering time, QNE1 and E4 may control flowering time through different regulatory mechanisms, based on expression studies and weighted gene co-expression network analysis of flowering time-related genes. Deciphering the molecular basis of QNE1 control of flowering time enriches our knowledge of flowering gene networks in soybean and will facilitate breeding soybean cultivars with broader latitudinal adaptation.

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Data availability

The raw sequence data reported in this article have been deposited in the Genome Sequence Archive (Genomics, Proteomics & Bioinformatics 2021) at the National Genomics Data Center (Nucleic Acids Res 2021), China National Center for Bioinformation/Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (GSA: CRA005685 for resequencing data of parents of population of Za14; CRA005687 for RNA-seq of leaf samples of Za14 and Y162 populations; CRA005686 for RNA-seq of leaf samples of transgenic Brassica napus plants overexpressing Qne1 or qne1 from soybean) and are publicly accessible at https://ngdc.cncb.ac.cn/gsa.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program (XDA24010105-4, XDA28070000), the Key Deployment Projects (ZDRW-ZS-2019-2) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (U21A20215, 31771818, 31771869), and the Young Scientists Group Project (2022QNXZ05) of Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

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  1. Contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Soybean Molecular Design Breeding, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Innovation Academy for Seed Design, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, 150081, China

    Zhengjun Xia, Hong Zhai, Yaying Wang, Lu Wang, Kun Xu, Hongyan Wu, Jinglong Zhu, Zhao Wan, Xiaobin Zhu, Yi Gao & Jinyu Liu

  2. Hybrid Rapeseed Research Center of Shaanxi Province, Yangling, 712100, China

    Yanfeng Zhang

  3. College of Life Science, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin, 150030, China

    Shuang Jiao, Yingxiang Liu & Rong Fan

  4. Institute of Industrial Crops, Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanjing, 210014, China

    Shihao Wu & Xin Chen

  5. Huaiyin Institute of Agricultural Science of Xuhuai Region, Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Huai’an, 223001, China

    Jiayin Yang

  6. USDA ARS, Soybean Genome & Improvement Lab, Beltsville, 20705, USA

    Qijian Song

  7. State Key Laboratory of Plant Cell and Chromosome Engineering, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Innovation Academy for Seed Design, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    Zhixi Tian

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  1. Zhengjun Xia
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  17. Jinyu Liu
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  18. Jiayin Yang
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  19. Qijian Song
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  20. Zhixi Tian
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Correspondence to Zhengjun Xia or Zhixi Tian.

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Xia, Z., Zhai, H., Zhang, Y. et al. QNE1 is a key flowering regulator determining the length of the vegetative period in soybean cultivars. Sci. China Life Sci. 65, 2472–2490 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11427-022-2117-x

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