Overexpression of grape ABA receptor gene VaPYL4 enhances tolerance to multiple abiotic stresses in Arabidopsis

Abstract

Background Abscisic acid (ABA) plays a crucial role in abiotic stress responses. The pyrabactin resistance (PYR)/PYR-like (PYL)/regulatory component of ABA receptor (RCAR) proteins that have been characterized as ABA receptors function as the core components in ABA signaling pathway. However, the functions of grape PYL genes in response to different abiotic stresses, particularly cold stress, remain less studied. Results In this study, we investigated the expression profiles of grape PYL genes upon cold treatment and isolated the VaPYL4 gene from Vitis amurensis, a cold-hardy grape species. Overexpression of VaPYL4 gene in grape calli and Arabidopsis resulted in enhanced cold tolerance. Moreover, plant resistance to drought and salt stress was also improved by overexpressing VaPYL4 in Arabidopsis. More importantly, we evaluated the contribution of VaPYL4 to plant growth and development after the treatment with cold, salt and drought stress simultaneously. The transgenic plants showed higher survival rates, earlier flowering phenotype, and heavier fresh weight of seedlings and siliques when compared with wild-type plants. Physiological analyses showed that transgenic plants had much lower content of malondialdehyde (MDA) and higher peroxidase (POD) activity. Stress-responsive genes such as RD29A (Responsive to desiccation 29A), COR15A (Cold responsive 15A) and KIN2 (Kinase 2) were also significantly up-regulated in VaPYL4-overexpressing Arabidopsis plants. Conclusions Our results show that overexpression of VaPYL4 could improve plant performance upon different abiotic stresses, which therefore provides a useful strategy for engineering future crops to deal with adverse environments.

Integrative physiological, transcriptome, and metabolome analyses reveal the associated genes and metabolites involved in cold stress response in common vetch (Vicia sativa L.)

“…Heatmap of transcript levels for genes and contents for metabolites that are involved in the biosynthesis of phenylpropanoids. signaling pathway, and previous studies reported that PYL genes are positive regulators related to stress response in ABA signaling transduction, such as PYL4 and PYL9 (Nai et al, 2022;Ren et al, 2022). In our study, we found that three PYR/PYL genes (c25218.graph_c0, c34730.graph_c0, and c49758.graph_c0) were significantly induced by cold treatment (Figure S18a), which suggested that the ABA signaling pathway plays an important role in the response of V. sativa to cold stress.…”

“…A total of 16 DEGs related to ABA signal transduction were obtained in the present study, and the expression level of most genes was induced during cold treatment except for three genes (Figure S17a). The pyrabactin resistance (PYR)/PYR‐like (PYL)/regulatory component of ABA receptor (RCAR) proteins that have been characterized as ABA receptors function as the core components in the ABA signaling pathway, and previous studies reported that PYL genes are positive regulators related to stress response in ABA signaling transduction, such as PYL4 and PYL9 (Nai et al, 2022; Ren et al, 2022). In our study, we found that three PYR / PYL genes (c25218.graph_c0, c34730.graph_c0, and c49758.graph_c0) were significantly induced by cold treatment (Figure S18a), which suggested that the ABA signaling pathway plays an important role in the response of V. sativa to cold stress.…”

Transcriptome Profiling Reveals Molecular Responses to Salt Stress in Common Vetch (Vicia sativa L.)

“…The overexpression of ABA receptor genes leads to enhanced salt tolerance. For example, overexpression of rice OsPYL5 and grape VaPYL4 enhances salt tolerance in Arabidopsis, respectively [ 31 , 32 ]. Various transcription factors, such as ABF, act downstream of SnRK2 to regulate the synthesis of compatible osmolytes in response to salt stress [ 33 , 34 ].…”

Integrated Physiological and Transcriptomic Analyses Revealed Improved Cold Tolerance in Cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) by Exogenous Chitosan Oligosaccharide

“…Furthermore, PYLs are the core regulators of ABA signal transduction in plants. Multiple reports have shown that PYLs can improve plant sensitivity to drought, osmotic stress, and cold heat stress [ 73 , 74 , 75 , 76 , 77 , 78 ]. In our study, the expression of two (CsaV3_3G033450, CsaV3_5G000620, CsaV3_5G010560, and CsaV3_6G001990) and one (CsaV3_4G026530) PYL genes was upregulated in the LC24 vs. L24 and in both the LC3 vs. L3 and LC24 vs. L24 pairwise comparisons, respectively ( Tables S2–S5 ).…”