Overexpression of potato transcription factor (StWRKY1) conferred resistance to Phytophthora infestans and improved tolerance to water stress

Abstract

Potato (Solanum tuberosum) late blight caused by oomycete Phytophthora infestans (Pi) is highly destructive to potato yield and cost huge losses each year. Regulation of a network of transcription machinery, controlled by transcription factors (TF's), is required to overcome the susceptibility. WRKY TF's are known to regulate transcription machinery upon biotic and abiotic stresses in different crop plants. We cloned and characterized a WRKY gene, StWRKY1, from potato cDNA synthesized from Pi infested leaves. StWRKY1 protein localized typically in the nucleus. Overexpression (OE) of StWRKY1 positively regulates Pi resistance as well as drought tolerance in transgenic potato. The elevated resistance in OE lines was co-related with higher accumulation of pathogenesis-related (PR) genes as compared to untransformed control plants. Interestingly, increased susceptibility of co-suppression (CSP) plants was associated with down regulation of PR genes expression. Moreover, transgenic lines overexpressing StWRKY1 showed tolerance in terms of less rate of water loss, during dehydration assay. Importantly, expression of StWRKY1 was upregulated upon treatment with plant hormones, suggesting its involvement in basal signal transduction pathway. Overall, our findings provided evidence that StWRKY1 positively regulate biotic and abiotic stress resistance thereby modulating plant basal defense networks, thus play a significant role for crop improvement.

WRKY genes family study reveals tissue-specific and stress-responsive TFs in wild potato species

“…To the authors' best knowledge, no expression data are available on ScWRKYs and SchWRKYs; by contrast, StWRKYs have previously received attention. Among them, only Shahzad et al 71 and Yogendra et al 72 found StWRKY010 (PGSC0003DMP400029302) and StWRKY020 (PGSC0003DMP400028763) to be active in P. infestans-potato interaction. Consistently with these data, our results indicated that the same genes increased their expression after BABA treatment, known to Scientific RepoRtS | (2020) 10:7196 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-63823-w www.nature.com/scientificreports www.nature.com/scientificreports/ confer protection against several biotic threats.…”

“…A few data on this gene family are available only in the cultivated potato, where Zhang et al 21 , Liu et al 22 and Cheng et al 12 identified 79, 82 and 81 StWRKYs, respectively. Previously, Dellagi et al 23 identified StWRKY1 as a good candidate for functional studies, and Shahzad et al 24 overexpressed it in potato. They provided evidence that StWRKY1 acts as positive regulator of biotic and abiotic stress resistance through the activation of basal defence networks.…”

Cloning and characterization of WRKY gene homologs in Chieh-qua (Benincasa hispida Cogn. var. Chieh-qua How) and their expression in response to fusaric acid treatment

“…Kim et al (2016) found that the expression of two cold-responsive genes, OsTGFR and WSI76, were elevated in rice OsWRKY71-overexpressing lines under cold stress suggesting OsWRKY71 as a positive regulator in cold tolerance. In potato, StWRKY1-overexpressing lines showed an enhanced resistance to Phytophthora infestans and an elevated tolerance to dehydration (Shahzad et al 2016). In addition, broccoli BoWRKY6-overexpressing mutant exhibited a highly resistance to downy mildew (Hyaloperonospora parasitica) (Jiang et al 2016).…”

Genome-Wide Characterization of Drought-Responsive Genes Accelerates Faba Bean Breeding Program

“…1). The association of growth performance with genotype in response to drought stress has been reported in several plant species such as maize, rice, potato and tomato (Yan et al, 2000;Sarma et al, 2016;Shahzad et al, 2016 andEwas et al, 2017a and.…”