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TaUBA, a UBA domain-containing protein in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), is a negative regulator of salt and drought stress response in transgenic Arabidopsis

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TaUBA functions as a negative regulator of salt and drought stress response in transgenic Arabidopsis, either the UBA domain or the zinc finger domain is crucial for TaUBA’s function.

Abstract

TaUBA (DQ211935), which is a UBA domain-containing protein in wheat, was cloned and functionally characterized. Southern blot suggested that TaUBA is a low copy gene in common wheat. qRT-PCR assay showed that the expression of TaUBA was strongly induced by salt and drought stress. When suffering from drought and salt stresses, lower proline content and much higher MDA content in the TaUBA overexpressors were observed than those of the wild-type control, suggesting TaUBA may function as a negative regulator of salt and drought stress response in plants. To study whether the UBA domain or the zinc finger domain affects the function of TaUBA, TaUBAΔUBA (deletion of UBA domain) and TaUBA-M (Cys464Gly and Cys467Gly) overexpression vectors were constructed and transformed into Arabidopsis. Upon drought and salt stresses, the TaUBAΔUBA-and TaUBA-M-overexpressed plants accumulated much more proline and lower MDA than the wild-type control, the TaUBA-overexpressors lost water more quickly than TaUBAΔUBA-and TaUBA-M-overexpressed plants as well as the wild-type control, suggesting that overexpression of TaUBAΔUBA or TaUBA-M improved the drought and salt tolerance of transgenic Arabidopsis plants and the possibility of ubiquitination role in the regulation of osmolyte synthesis and oxidative stress responses in mediating stress tolerance. qRT-PCR assay of stress-related genes in transgenic plants upon drought and salt stresses suggested that TaUBA may function through down-regulating some stress related-transcription factors and by regulating P5CSs to cope with osmotic stress.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30771348 and No. 31101129) and Natural Science Foundation of Hebei Province (No. C2011205061).

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All the authors agreed on the contents of the paper and post no conflicting interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Science, Hebei Normal University, Shijiazhuang, 050024, China

    Xiao Li, Shuang-shuang Zhang, Jun-xia Ma, Guang-yan Guo & Cai-li Bi

  2. Crop Science Institute, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences/Key Laboratory of Crop Germplasm Resources and Biotechnology, Ministry of Agriculture, Beijing, 100081, China

    Xue-yong Zhang & Xu Liu

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  1. Xiao Li
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  2. Shuang-shuang Zhang
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  3. Jun-xia Ma
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Correspondence to Cai-li Bi.

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Communicated by N. Sreenivasulu.

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Li, X., Zhang, Ss., Ma, Jx. et al. TaUBA, a UBA domain-containing protein in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), is a negative regulator of salt and drought stress response in transgenic Arabidopsis. Plant Cell Rep 34, 755–766 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00299-015-1739-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00299-015-1739-3

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