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Functional studies of AtACR2 gene putatively involved in accumulation, reduction and/or sequestration of arsenic species in plants

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Abstract

Food-based exposure to arsenic is a human carcinogen and can severely impact human health resulting in many cancerous diseases and various neurological and vascular disorders. This project is a part of our attempts to develop new varieties of crops for avoiding arsenic contaminated foods. For this purpose, we have previously identified four key genes, and molecular functions of two of these, AtACR2 and AtPCS1, have been studied based on both in silico and in vivo experiments. In the present study, a T-DNA tagged mutant, (SALK_143282C with mutation in AtACR2 gene) of Arabidopsis thaliana was studied for further verification of the function of AtACR2 gene. Semi-quantitative RT-PCR analyses revealed that this mutant exhibits a significantly reduced expression of the AtACR2 gene. When exposed to 100 μM of arsenate (AsV) for three weeks, the mutant plants accumulated arsenic approximately three times higher (778 μg/g d. wt.) than that observed in the control plants (235 μg/g d. wt.). In contrast, when the plants were exposed to 100 j.M of arsenite (AsIII), no significant difference in arsenic accumulation was observed between the control and the mutant plants (535 μg/g d. wt. and 498 μg/g d. wt., respectively). Also, when arsenate and arsenite was measured separately either in shoots or roots, significant differences in accumulation of these substances were observed between the mutant and the control plants. These results suggest that AtACR2 gene is involved not only in accumulation of arsenic in plants, but also in conversion of arsenate to arsenite inside the plant cells.

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Abbreviations

ACR2:

arsenate reductase 2

As:

arsenic

AsIII:

arsenite

AsV:

arsenate

DMA:

dimethylarsinic acid

GAPDH:

glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase

Gpase:

glycogen phosphorylase

Grx:

glutaredoxin

GSH:

glutathione

ICP-DRC-MS:

inductively coupled plasma dynamic reaction cell mass spectrometry

ICV:

initial calibration verification

MMA:

monomethylarsonic acid

MS:

Murashige-Skoog

MT:

mutant type

PNPase:

purine nucleoside phosphorylase

PT-Pase:

protein tyrosine phosphatase

WT:

wild type

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Systems Biology Research Center, School of Bioscience, University of Skövde, P. O. Box 408, SE-541 28, Skövde, Sweden

    Noor Nahar, Aminur Rahman & Abul Manual

  2. School of Arts and Science, Iona College, New Rochelle, NY, 10801, USA

    Sibdas Ghosh

  3. Dr. D. Y. Patil Biotechnology and Bioinformatics Institute, Microbial Diversity Research Centre, Dr. D. Y. Patil Vidyapeeth, Tathawade, Pune -, 411033, India

    Neelu Nawani

Authors
  1. Noor Nahar
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  2. Aminur Rahman
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  4. Neelu Nawani
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  5. Abul Manual
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Correspondence to Aminur Rahman.

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Nahar, N., Rahman, A., Ghosh, S. et al. Functional studies of AtACR2 gene putatively involved in accumulation, reduction and/or sequestration of arsenic species in plants. Biologia 72, 520–526 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1515/biolog-2017-0062

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/biolog-2017-0062

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