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Experimental sink removal induces stress responses, including shifts in amino acid and phenylpropanoid metabolism, in soybean leaves

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Abstract

The repeated removal of flower, fruit, or vegetative buds is a common treatment to simulate sink limitation. These experiments usually lead to the accumulation of specific proteins, which are degraded during later stages of seed development, and have thus been designated as vegetative storage proteins. We used oligonucleotide microarrays to assess global effects of sink removal on gene expression patterns in soybean leaves and found an induction of the transcript levels of hundreds of genes with putative roles in the responses to biotic and abiotic stresses. In addition, these data sets indicated potential changes in amino acid and phenylpropanoid metabolism. As a response to sink removal we detected an induced accumulation of γ-aminobutyric acid, while proteinogenic amino acid levels decreased. We also observed a shift in phenylpropanoid metabolism with an increase in isoflavone levels, concomitant with a decrease in flavones and flavonols. Taken together, we provide evidence that sink removal leads to an up-regulation of stress responses in distant leaves, which needs to be considered as an unintended consequence of this experimental treatment.

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Abbreviations

PVM:

Paraveinal mesophyll

Vlx:

Vegetative lipoxygenase

Vsp:

Vegetative storage protein

FW:

Fresh weight

PCR:

Polymerase chain reaction

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by a Grant from the Department of Energy (DE-FG02-05ER15672 (H.D.G.). We are grateful to Mr. Derek Pouchnik (School of Molecular Biosciences) for performing microarray hybridizations and assisting in data analysis. We also thank Ms. Sue Vogtman (Institute of Biological Chemistry) and Mr. Charles Cody (School of Biological Sciences) for help with growing plants.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Biological Chemistry, M.J. Murdock Metabolomics Laboratory, Washington State University, P.O. Box 646340, Pullman, WA, 99164-6340, USA

    Glenn W. Turner, Daniel J. Cuthbertson, Siau Sie Voo & B. Markus Lange

  2. School of Molecular Biosciences (M.L.S., H.D.G.), Washington State University, P.O. Box 646340, Pullman, WA, 99164-6340, USA

    Matthew L. Settles & Howard D. Grimes

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  1. Glenn W. Turner
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  2. Daniel J. Cuthbertson
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  3. Siau Sie Voo
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  4. Matthew L. Settles
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  5. Howard D. Grimes
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  6. B. Markus Lange
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Correspondence to B. Markus Lange.

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G. W. Turner and D. J. Cuthbertson contributed equally.

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Supplemental Material S1 Microarray analysis of the effects of repeated sink removal on gene expression patterns in soybean leaves

Supplemental Material S2 Meta data for microarray analysis of the effects of repeated sink removal on gene expression patterns in soybean leaves

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Supplementary material 2 (XLS 56 kb)

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Turner, G.W., Cuthbertson, D.J., Voo, S.S. et al. Experimental sink removal induces stress responses, including shifts in amino acid and phenylpropanoid metabolism, in soybean leaves. Planta 235, 939–954 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-011-1551-4

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