Combined proteomics, metabolomics and physiological analyses of rice growth and grain yield with heavy nitrogen application before and after drought

Abstract

Background Nitrogen application can effectively mitigate the damage to crop growth and yield caused by drought. However, the efficiency of heavy nitrogen application before drought (NBD) and heavy nitrogen application after drought (NAD) to regulate rice response to drought stress remains controversial. In this study, we profiled physiology, proteomics and metabolomics in rice variety Wufengyou 286 of two nitrogen management modes (NBD and NAD) to investigate their yield formation and the mechanism of nitrogen regulation for drought resistance. Results Results revealed that the yield of NBD and NAD decreased significantly when it was subjected to drought stress at the stage of young panicle differentiation, while the yield of NBD was 33.85 and 36.33% higher than that of NAD in 2017 and 2018, reaching significant levels. Under drought conditions, NBD increased chlorophyll content and net photosynthetic rate in leaves, significantly improved the activities of antioxidant enzymes such as superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase and catalase, and decreased malondialdehyde (MDA) content compared with NAD. NBD promoted nitrogen assimilation in leaves, which was characterized by increased activities of nitrate reductase (NR) and glutamine synthetase (GS). In addition, NBD significantly increased the contents of osmotic regulatory substances such as soluble sugar, soluble protein and free proline. Gene ontology and KEGG enrichment analysis of 234 differentially expressed proteins and 518 differential metabolites showed that different nitrogen management induced strong changes in photosynthesis pathway, energy metabolism pathway, nitrogen metabolism and oxidation-reduction pathways. Conclusion Different nitrogen management methods have significant differences in drought resistance of rice. These results suggest that heavy nitrogen application before drought may be an important pathway to improve the yield and stress resistance of rice, and provide a new ecological perspective on nitrogen regulation in rice.

Increase Crop Resilience to Heat Stress Using Omic Strategies

“…A combination of proteomics and metabolomics revealed a regulatory network in crops to abiotic stresses, such as heat ( Wang et al, 2018 ), drought ( Michaletti et al, 2018 ; Budzinski et al, 2019 ; Du et al, 2020 ), and drought–flood alternation ( Xiong et al, 2019 ). Michaletti et al (2018) revealed that total protein content decreased more severely in drought-sensitive wheat than in drought-tolerant wheat and drought stress changed the abundance of main metabolites ( Michaletti et al, 2018 ).…”

“…High storage of protein content and high stable filling rate in wheat at heat stress are due to the reallocation of energy to heat protection and reserves deposition ( Wang et al, 2018 ). Du et al (2020) found that the drought response of rice was altered by nitrogen management methods as indicated by differentially expressed proteins and differential metabolites ( Du et al, 2020 ). Halosufuron-methyl (HSM) stress induced the accumulation of detoxification-related proteins and metabolites in soybean ( Li Y. et al, 2020 ).…”

Physiological and Multi-Omics Approaches for Explaining Drought Stress Tolerance and Supporting Sustainable Production of Rice

“…The majority of the identified DAPs under drought conditions were related to photosynthesis, oxidative stress response, proteolysis, and translation of stress-responsive proteins, such as heat shock, and LEA proteins (late embryogenesis-associated proteins) sharply increased under drought stress. Du et al (2020) investigated the physiology of rice grown under two nitrogen management modes by proteomics and metabolomics approaches to investigate their yield formation and the mechanism of nitrogen regulation for drought tolerance. It was evident from the proteomic analysis that the most altered biological processes and pathways were related to the biosynthesis of primary and secondary metabolites important for the growth and metabolism of crop plants.…”

Toward Integrated Multi-Omics Intervention: Rice Trait Improvement and Stress Management

“…In all the 8 genotypes, 8 proteins were induced under drought stress (Hamzelou et al, 2020). A more comprehensive study by Du J. et al (2020) involved proteomics, metabolomics, and physiological analyses upon heavy nitrogen exposure before (NBD) and after drought (NAD) on rice (Du J. et al, 2020). The proteomic experiments were carried by tandem mass tagging of rice leaves subjected to NBD and NAD.…”

“…The samples were analyzed by LC-MS-MS with the amount of qualitative protein and quantitative protein being 4254 and 3892 respectively. Upon drought exposure, NBD had higher chlorophyll content and photosynthetic rate, enhanced activities of antioxidant enzymes such as superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase, and catalase, and declined malondialdehyde (MDA) content (Du J. et al, 2020). Next, the application of multi-omics in salinity stress involves an analysis by Xu et al (2017) utilizing the techniques 2-DE and MALDI TOF (Xu et al, 2017).…”