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Identification of the LEA family members from Caragana korshinskii (Fabaceae) and functional characterization of CkLEA2-3 in response to abiotic stress in Arabidopsis

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Abstract

Plants are exposed to different abiotic stresses that affect growth, development, and productivity. Previous studies have shown that late embryogenesis abundant (LEA) proteins play important roles in plant adaptation to abiotic stresses. However, reports that demonstrate their biological functions, especially in Caragana korshinskii Kom., are still very limited. In this study, 26 LEA genes were identified from dehydration-treated suppressive subtractive hybridizations cDNA library and transcriptome sequencing data of C. korshinskii, and were classified into seven groups according to their structural features. Quantitative real-time PCR analysis revealed that the CkLEAs were induced by abscisic acid (ABA) and diverse abiotic stresses and widely expressed in various tissues. Moreover, overexpression of CkLEA2-3 in Arabidopsis thaliana L. Heynh resulted in enhanced tolerance to ABA treatment, and osmotic and salt stresses during seed germination. CkLEA2-3 overexpression lines also exhibited resistance to drought stress during seedling development. Taken together, our results indicate that CkLEA2-3 plays positive roles in conferring abiotic stress tolerance in Arabidopsis.

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Acknowledgements

We deeply appreciated Dr. Mark Goettel, Editor-in-Chief of Biocontrol Science & Technology, for polishing the manuscript carefully. This work was supported by the grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (31560199) to Qi Yang.

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  1. Xiumin Yu, Wenran Yue, and Qi Yang have contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Sciences, Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, 010018, China

    Xiumin Yu, Wenran Yue, Qi Yang, Yanna Zhang, Xiaomin Han, Feiyun Yang, Ruigang Wang & Guojing Li

  2. Department of Histology and Embryology, Baotou Medical College, Baotou, Inner Mongolia, 014040, China

    Xiaomin Han

  3. College of Food Sciences and Engineering, Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, 010018, China

    Feiyun Yang

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Contributions

GL and XY conceived and designed the experiments. XY, WY, QY, and YZ carried out the experiments. XY and GL drafted the manuscript. QY, XH, FY, and RW participated in the design of experiments and edited the manuscript. All authors read, edited, and approved the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Guojing Li.

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40415_2019_529_MOESM2_ESM.tif

Supplementary Fig. 1 qRT-PCR analysis of CkLEA2-3 expression level in leaves of overexpression lines. The T3 transgenic plants growing under normal condition were detected by quantitative real-time PCR. Expression values were calculated using 2−ΔCT method, and AtEF1α was used as an internal control. Means ± SEs, n = 3 (TIFF 265 kb)

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Yu, X., Yue, W., Yang, Q. et al. Identification of the LEA family members from Caragana korshinskii (Fabaceae) and functional characterization of CkLEA2-3 in response to abiotic stress in Arabidopsis. Braz. J. Bot 42, 227–238 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40415-019-00529-y

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