Abstract
Tocopherols and tocotrienols, collectively known as tocochromanols, are lipid-soluble molecules that belong to the group of vitamin E compounds. Among them, α-tocopherol (αΤ) is one of the antioxidants with diverse functions and benefits for humans and animals. Thus, understanding the genetic basis of these traits would be valuable to improve nutritional quality by breeding in rice. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) has emerged as a powerful strategy for identifying genes or quantitative trait loci (QTL) underlying complex traits in plants. To discover the genes or QTLs underlying the naturally occurring variations of αΤ content in rice, we performed GWAS using 1.44 million high-quality single-nucleotide polymorphisms acquired from re-sequencing of 137 accessions from a diverse rice core collection. Thirteen candidate genes were found across 2-year phenotypic data, among which gamma-tocopherol methyltransferase (OsγTMT) was identified as the major factor responsible for the αΤ content among rice accessions. Nucleotide variations in the coding region of OsγTMT were significantly associated with the αΤ content variations, while nucleotide polymorphisms in the promoter region of OsγTMT also could partly demonstrate the correlation with αΤ content variations, according to our RNA expression analyses. This study provides useful information for genetic factors underlying αΤ content variations in rice, which will significantly contribute the research on αΤ biosynthesis mechanisms and αΤ improvement of rice.
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by Next-Generation BioGreen21 Program (PJ01116101). This research was supported by Bio-industry Technology Development Program Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Republic of Korea. (No. 110136-5).
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Xiao-Qiang Wang declares that he has no conflict of interest. Min-Young Yoon declares that he has no conflict of interest. Qiang He declares that he has no conflict of interest. Tae-Sung Kim declares that he has no conflict of interest. Wei Tong declares that he has no conflict of interest. Bu-Woong Choi declares that he has no conflict of interest. Young-Sang Lee declares that he has no conflict of interest. Yong-Jin Park declares that he has no conflict of interest.
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Wang, XQ., Yoon, MY., He, Q. et al. Natural variations in OsγTMT contribute to diversity of the α-tocopherol content in rice. Mol Genet Genomics 290, 2121–2135 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00438-015-1059-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00438-015-1059-x