Arabidopsis casein kinase 1-like 8 enhances NaCl tolerance, early flowering, and the expression of flowering-related genes

Abstract

Members of the casein kinase 1 (CK1) family are evolutionarily conserved eukaryotic protein kinases involved in various cellular, physiological, and developmental processes in yeast. However, the biological roles of CK1 members in plants are poorly understood. Here, we report that an Arabidopsis CK1 member named casein kinase 1-like 8 (CKL8) was ubiquitously expressed in all plant organs, mainly in the stems of seedlings according to quantitative real-time PCR. Western blotting showed a remarkable expression of the AtCKL8 gene in transgenic plants induced by high salinity. A histochemical assay of AtCKL8 promoter::GUS expression revealed that the AtCKL8 promoter is very active in both seedlings and adult plants subjected to the salinity stress, while no GUS activity was detectable in all the transgenic plants grown under normal conditions. In a subcellular distribution analysis, the AtCKL8-GFP fusion protein was localized mainly in the cell membrane. AtCKL8-overexpressing transgenic plants showed an insensitivity to high salinity and an early flowering phenotype. Overall, these findings suggest that AtCKL8 plays a positive role in NaCl signaling and improves salt stress tolerance in transgenic Arabidopsis. ARTICLE HISTORY

Conjunctive Analyses of BSA-Seq and BSR-Seq to Reveal the Molecular Pathway of Leafy Head Formation in Chinese Cabbage

“…Based on the conjunctive analyses of BSA-Seq and BSR-Seq, the BrCKL8 (Bra035974) gene was identified as a common candidate gene associated with leafy head formation in Chinese cabbage, where its expression level was higher at the three parts of mature leaf in heading type plants than in non-heading type plants ( Figure 5A). In Arabidopsis, Casein kinase 1 (CK1) isoform CK1.8 negatively regulates the ethylene biosynthesis by phosphorylating the key enzyme of ethylene biosynthesis ACS5 and promoting its interaction with the E3 ubiquitin ligase Ethylene Overproduction 1 (ETO1); the ck1.8-1 seedlings exhibited shortened hypocotyls under dark conditions and the AtCKL8-overexpressing transgenic plants showed an enhanced NaCl tolerance [27,28]. Ethylene takes the opposite effect on the cell expansion of petiole at the abaxial and adaxial side [29].…”

Integrating a newly developed BAC-based physical mapping resource for Lolium perenne with a genome-wide association study across a L. perenne European ecotype collection identifies genomic contexts associated with agriculturally important traits

“…Twenty-seven of these gene models were associated with annotations, one of which (Bradi2g51370/HORVU3Hr1G075540) represents a member of the Casein Kinase 1 gene family ( CK1 ). Members of this gene family have been directly associated with the modulation of flowering time in both Arabidopsis thaliana (hereafter referred to as arabidopsis) and rice (Tan et al , 2013; Kwon et al , 2015; Zhang et al , 2016) and, in the latter case, a CK1 gene underlies the Hd16/Early Flowering 1 heading date QTL (Dai and Xue, 2010; Hori et al , 2013). Marker ctg8613 has not previously been genetically mapped in L. perenne but superpool/matrix pool screens of a different marker, R1_302, identified three independent BACs from contig 4073c-18.…”

Biotic interactions promote local adaptation to soil in plants

“…Therefore, long term field studies or experimental evolution approaches provide a more powerful approach to detect antagonistically pleiotropic loci 14 . For example, in an 8-year field study on Arabidopsis thaliana conducted in Italy and Sweden, four fitness QTLs displayed a pattern of antagonistic pleiotropy and seven show that of conditional neutrality 8 . Other studies have used herbarium genomics or resurrection experiments to detect antagonistic selection in loci across populations, leading to strong population-differentiation for certain loci 15,16 .…”

“…a genetic trade-off), where different alleles at a locus are favored in different environments [4][5][6][7] . The relative importance of these mechanisms in local adaptation remains unclear 8,9 . Antagonistic pleiotropy is considered to be critical for the maintenance of genetic variation among natural populations, but direct experimental proof of this mechanism remains scarce [6][7][8][10][11][12] .…”

“…The relative importance of these mechanisms in local adaptation remains unclear 8,9 . Antagonistic pleiotropy is considered to be critical for the maintenance of genetic variation among natural populations, but direct experimental proof of this mechanism remains scarce [6][7][8][10][11][12] . To detect the genomic basis of local adaptation, most studies use reciprocal transplant experiments and measure fitness-marker associations in organisms in the local versus a foreign environment 13 .…”