Title : Growth phenotyping and transcription profiling revealed a novel tobacco germplasm with certain core genes in response to a short-term phosphorus nutrient deprivation.
Abstract:
The availability of phosphorus (P) in soils is a critical determinant for plant growth and development. In this work, we assessed 18 tobacco cultivars (Nicotiana tabacum L. cv) for their P-utilization capabilities under hydroponic culture with three distinct P concentrations (0.02 mM, 1 mM, 10 mM; in the form of H2PO4-). P-nutrition related phenotypical- and physiological-dissection revealed diverse growth-responsive abilities of these cultivars to accommodate external P supply. Particularly, the cultivar K730 was selected out as a P-efficient one with a great potential, while YZ94-1 displayed a less tolerance to lower P supplementation. To comprehend possible genetic components underlying these phenotypic variations related to plant P use efficiency, we performed a time-dependent RNA-sequencing assay on K730 and YZ94-1 treated by P-deprivation and -resupply after P-depletion. Interestingly, we observed 1471 DEGs in K730 under P-deprivation for between 1-day and 3-day, in great contrast to only 16 DEGs found in YZ94-1. This may suggest a unique short-term or quick response of K730 to environmental P-insufficiency, a phenomenon not so far reported in other model crops like rice. Gene Ontology (GO) analysis further indicated that approximately one-third of these 1471 DEGs were associated with the cellular component termed "chloroplast." Additionally, analysis of cis-regulatory elements (CREs) using "PWMEnrich" uncovered four motifs enriched in the promoter regions ranging from -1 to -2000 bp upstream of their translational start of the related DEGs. Such findings point to that these CREs might play a pivotal role in regulating the short-term P response involved in crop/tobacco P-use-efficiency. Thus, our study not only identifies K730 as a promising tobacco germplasm with a property of the remarkable short-term response to P-deprivation but also detect certain new CREs, which might be implicated in the molecular regulation of crop tolerance to P-deficiency before plant growth is hardly suppressed by P-nutrient limitation. Further interesting issues will be discussed in detail at conference.
Audience Takeaway:
- To show the audience how to conduct an experiment for the growth phenotyping of crop/tobacco varieties under hydroponic growth conditions.
- To explain the audience how to perform an experiment and analysis of some key genes involved in plant growth response to phosphorus nutrient variation.
- To describe how to survey some general molecular components probably regulating plant phosphorus use efficiency.
