scholarly journals Transcriptomic Analysis Reveals Genes Mediating Salt Tolerance through Calcineurin/CchA-Independent Signaling inAspergillus nidulans

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sha Wang ◽  
Hongchang Zhou ◽  
Jun Wu ◽  
Jiangyu Han ◽  
Shasha Li ◽  
...  

Adaptation to changes in the environment is crucial for the viability of all organisms. Although the importance of calcineurin in the stress response has been highlighted in filamentous fungi, little is known about the involvement of ion-responsive genes and pathways in conferring salt tolerance without calcium signaling. In this study, high-throughput RNA-seq was used to investigate salt stress-induced genes in the parent, ΔcnaB, and ΔcnaBΔcchAstrains ofAspergillus nidulans, which differ greatly in salt adaption. In total, 2,884 differentially expressed genes including 1,382 up- and 1,502 downregulated genes were identified. Secondary transporters, which were upregulated to a greater extent in ΔcnaBΔcchAthan in the parent or ΔcnaBstrains, are likely to play important roles in response to salt stress. Furthermore, 36 genes were exclusively upregulated in the ΔcnaBΔcchAunder salt stress. Functional analysis of differentially expressed genes revealed that genes involved in transport, heat shock protein binding, and cell division processes were exclusively activated in ΔcnaBΔcchA. Overall, our findings reveal that secondary transporters and stress-responsive genes may play crucial roles in salt tolerance to bypass the requirement for the CchA-calcineurin pathway, contributing to a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that influence fungal salt stress adaption inAspergillus.

Plants ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 891 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mobina Ulfat ◽  
Habib-ur-Rehman Athar ◽  
Zaheerud-din Khan ◽  
Hazem M. Kalaji

Salinity is one of the major abiotic stresses prevailing throughout the world that severely limits crop establishment and production. Every crop has an intra-specific genetic variation that enables it to cope with variable environmental conditions. Hence, this genetic variability is a good tool to exploit germplasms in salt-affected areas. Further, the selected cultivars can be effectively used by plant breeders and molecular biologists for the improvement of salinity tolerance. In the present study, it was planned to identify differential expression of genes associated with selective uptake of different ions under salt stress in selected salt-tolerant canola (Brassica napus L.) cultivar. For the purpose, an experiment was carried out to evaluate the growth response of different salt-sensitive and salt-tolerant canola cultivars. Plants were subjected to 200 mM NaCl stress. Canola cultivars—Faisal Canola, DGL, Dunkled, and CON-II—had higher growth than in cvs Cyclone, Ac-EXcel, Legend, and Oscar. Salt-tolerant cultivars were better able to maintain plant water status probably through osmotic adjustment as compared to salt-sensitive cultivars. Although salt stress increased shoot Na+ and shoot Cl− contents in all canola cultivars, salt-tolerant cultivars had a lower accumulation of these toxic nutrients. Similarly, salt stress reduced shoot K+ and Ca2+ contents in all canola cultivars, while salt-tolerant cultivars had a higher accumulation of K+ and Ca2+ in leaves, thereby having greater shoot K+/Na+ and Ca2+/Na+ ratios. Nutrient utilization efficiency decreased significantly in all canola cultivars due to the imposition of salt stress; however, it was greater in salt-tolerant cultivars—Faisal Canola, DGL, and Dunkled. Among four salt-tolerant canola cultivars, cv Dunkled was maximal in physiological attributes, and thus differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were assessed in it by RNA-seq analysis using next-generation sequencing (NGS) techniques. The differentially expressed genes (DEG) in cv Dunkled under salt stress were found to be involved in the regulation of ionic concentration, photosynthesis, antioxidants, and hormonal metabolism. However, the most prominent upregulated DEGs included Na/K transporter, HKT1, potassium transporter, potassium channel, chloride channel, cation exchanger, Ca channel. The RNA-seq data were validated through qRT-PCR. It was thus concluded that genes related to the regulation of ionic concentrate are significantly upregulated and expressed under salt stress, in the cultivar Dunkled.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (23) ◽  
pp. 5910 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gui Geng ◽  
Chunhua Lv ◽  
Piergiorgio Stevanato ◽  
Renren Li ◽  
Hui Liu ◽  
...  

Soil salinization is a common environmental problem that seriously affects the yield and quality of crops. Sugar beet (Beta vulgaris L.), one of the main sugar crops in the world, shows a strong tolerance to salt stress. To decipher the molecular mechanism of sugar beet under salt stress, we conducted transcriptomic analyses of two contrasting sugar beet genotypes. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first comparison of salt-response transcriptomes in sugar beet with contrasting genotypes. Compared to the salt-sensitive cultivar (S710), the salt-tolerant one (T710MU) showed better growth and exhibited a higher chlorophyll content, higher antioxidant enzyme activity, and increased levels of osmotic adjustment molecules. Based on a high-throughput experimental system, 1714 differentially expressed genes were identified in the leaves of the salt-sensitive genotype, and 2912 in the salt-tolerant one. Many of the differentially expressed genes were involved in stress and defense responses, metabolic processes, signal transduction, transport processes, and cell wall synthesis. Moreover, expression patterns of several genes differed between the two cultivars in response to salt stress, and several key pathways involved in determining the salt tolerance of sugar beet, were identified. Our results revealed the mechanism of salt tolerance in sugar beet and provided potential metabolic pathways and gene markers for growing salt-tolerant cultivars.


PeerJ ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. e12492
Author(s):  
Xun Liu ◽  
Xinxia Yang ◽  
Bin Zhang

Salinity is one of the major abiotic stress that limits crop growth and productivity. We investigated the transcriptomes of salt-treated soybean seedlings versus a control using RNA-seq to better understand the molecular mechanisms of the soybean (Glycine max L.) response to salt stress. Transcriptome analysis revealed 1,235 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) under salt stress. Several important pathways and key candidate genes were identified by KEGG enrichment. A total of 116 differentially expressed transcription factors (TFs) were identified, and 17 TFs were found to belong to MYB families. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that these TFs may be involved in salt stress adaptation. Further analysis revealed that GmMYB46 was up-regulated by salt and mannitol and was localized in the nucleus. The salt tolerance of transgenic Arabidopsis overexpressing GmMYB46 was significantly enhanced compared to wild-type (WT). GmMYB46 activates the expression of salt stress response genes (P5CS1, SOD, POD, NCED3) in Arabidopsis under salt stress, indicating that the GmMYB46 protein mediates the salt stress response through complex regulatory mechanisms. This study provides information with which to better understand the molecular mechanism of salt tolerance in soybeans and to genetically improve the crop.


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yanchao Yuan ◽  
Huixian Xing ◽  
Wenguan Zeng ◽  
Jialing Xu ◽  
Lili Mao ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Salinity is a major abiotic stress seriously hindering crop yield. Development and utilization of tolerant varieties is the most economical way to address soil salinity. Upland cotton is a major fiber crop and pioneer plant on saline soil and thus its genetic architecture underlying salt tolerance should be extensively explored. Results In this study, genome-wide association analysis and RNA sequencing were employed to detect salt-tolerant qualitative-trait loci (QTLs) and candidate genes in 196 upland cotton genotypes at the germination stage. Using comprehensive evaluation values of salt tolerance in four environments, we identified 33 significant single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), including 17 and 7 SNPs under at least two and four environments, respectively. The 17 stable SNPs were located within or near 98 candidate genes in 13 QTLs, including 35 genes that were functionally annotated to be involved in salt stress responses. RNA-seq analysis indicated that among the 98 candidate genes, 13 were stably differentially expressed. Furthermore, 12 of the 13 candidate genes were verified by qRT-PCR. RNA-seq analysis detected 6640, 3878, and 6462 differentially expressed genes at three sampling time points, of which 869 were shared. Conclusions These results, including the elite cotton accessions with accurate salt tolerance evaluation, the significant SNP markers, the candidate genes, and the salt-tolerant pathways, could improve our understanding of the molecular regulatory mechanisms under salt stress tolerance and genetic manipulation for cotton improvement.


2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 138
Author(s):  
Longjie Ni ◽  
Zhiquan Wang ◽  
Xiangdong Liu ◽  
Shuting Wu ◽  
Jianfeng Hua ◽  
...  

Hibiscus hamabo Sieb. et Zucc is an important semi-mangrove plant with great morphological features and strong salt resistance. In this study, by combining single molecule real time and next-generation sequencing technologies, we explored the transcriptomic changes in the roots of salt stressed H. hamabo. A total of 94,562 unigenes were obtained by clustering the same isoforms using the PacBio RSII platform, and 2269 differentially expressed genes were obtained under salt stress using the Illumina platform. There were 519 differentially expressed genes co-expressed at each treatment time point under salt stress, and these genes were found to be enriched in ion signal transduction and plant hormone signal transduction. We used Arabidopsis thaliana (L.) Heynh. transformation to confirm the function of the HhWRKY79 gene and discovered that overexpression enhanced salt tolerance. The full-length transcripts generated in this study provide a full characterization of the transcriptome of H. hamabo and may be useful in mining new salt stress-related genes specific to this species, while facilitating the understanding of the salt tolerance mechanisms.


2018 ◽  
Vol 19 (8) ◽  
pp. 2229 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Li ◽  
Xiao-Jing Qiang ◽  
Xiao-Ri Han ◽  
Lin-Lin Jiang ◽  
Shu-Hui Zhang ◽  
...  

Aquaporins play important regulatory roles in the transport of water and small molecules in plants. In this study, a Thellungiella salsuginea TsPIP1;1 aquaporin was transformed into Kitaake rice, and three transgenic lines were evaluated by profiling the changes of the physiological metabolism, osmotic potential, and differentially expressed genes under salt stress. The TsPIP1;1 protein contains six transmembrane domains and is localized in the cytoplasm membrane. Overexpression of the TsPIP1;1 gene not only increased the accumulation of prolines, soluble sugars and chlorophyll, but also lowered the osmotic potential and malondialdehyde content in rice under salt stress, and alleviated the amount of salt damage done to rice organs by regulating the distribution of Na/K ions, thereby promoting photosynthetic rates. Transcriptome sequencing confirmed that the differentially expressed genes that are up-regulated in rice positively respond to salt stimulus, the photosynthetic metabolic process, and the accumulation profiles of small molecules and Na/K ions. The co-expressed Rubisco and LHCA4 genes in rice were remarkably up-regulated under salt stress. This data suggests that overexpression of the TsPIP1;1 gene is involved in the regulation of water transport, the accumulation of Na/K ions, and the translocation of photosynthetic metabolites, thus conferring enhanced salt tolerance to rice.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiming Chen ◽  
Huizhen Dong ◽  
Zhihua Xie ◽  
Kaijie Qi ◽  
Xiaosan Huang ◽  
...  

Abstract Background: Pear is one of the most abundant fruit crops and has been cultivated world-wide. However, the salt injury events caused by increased salinity limited the distribution and sustainable production of pear crops. Therefore, it is needed to take further efforts to understand the genetics and mechanisms of salt tolerance to improved salt resistance and productivity.Results: In this work, we analyzed the dynamic transcriptome of pear (Pyrus ussuriensis Maxim) under salt stress by using RNA-Seq and WGCNA. A total of 3540, 3831, 8374, 6267 and 5381 genes were identified that were differentially expressed after exposure to 200mM NaCl for 4, 6, 12, 24 and 48 hours, respectively, and 1163 genes were shared among the five comparisons. KEGG enrichment analysis of these DEGs (differentially expressed genes) revealed that “MAPK signaling” and “Plant hormone signal transduction” pathways were highly enriched. Meanwhile, 622 DEGs identified from WGCNA were highly correlated with these pathways, and some of them were able to indicate the salt tolerance of pear varieties. In addition, we provide a network to demonstrate the time-sequence of these co-expressed MAPK and hormone related genes.Conclusion: A comprehensive analysis about salt-responsive pear transcriptome were performed by using RNA-Seq and WGCNA. We demonstrated that “MAPK signaling” and “Plant hormone signal transduction” pathways were highly recruited during salt stress, and provided new insights into the metabolism of plant hormones related signaling at transcriptome level underlying salt resistance in pear. The dynamic transcriptome data obtained from this study and these salt-sensitive DEGs may provide potential genes as suitable targets for further biotechnological manipulation to improve pear salt tolerance.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Surendra Bhattarai ◽  
Yong-Bi Fu ◽  
Bruce Coulman ◽  
Karen Tanino ◽  
Chithra Karunakaran ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) production decreases under salt stress. Identification of genes associated with salt tolerance in alfalfa is essential for the development of molecular markers used for breeding and genetic improvement. Result An RNA-Seq technique was applied to identify the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) associated with salt stress in two alfalfa cultivars: salt tolerant ‘Halo’ and salt intolerant ‘Vernal’. Leaf and root tissues were sampled for RNA extraction at 0 h, 3 h, and 27 h under 12 dS m− 1 salt stress maintained by NaCl. The sequencing generated a total of 381 million clean sequence reads and 84.8% were mapped on to the alfalfa reference genome. A total of 237 DEGs were identified in leaves and 295 DEGs in roots of the two alfalfa cultivars. In leaf tissue, the two cultivars had a similar number of DEGs at 3 h and 27 h of salt stress, with 31 and 49 DEGs for ‘Halo’, 34 and 50 for ‘Vernal’, respectively. In root tissue, ‘Halo’ maintained 55 and 56 DEGs at 3 h and 27 h, respectively, while the number of DEGs decreased from 42 to 10 for ‘Vernal’. This differential expression pattern highlights different genetic responses of the two cultivars to salt stress at different time points. Interestingly, 28 (leaf) and 31 (root) salt responsive candidate genes were highly expressed in ‘Halo’ compared to ‘Vernal’ under salt stress, of which 13 candidate genes were common for leaf and root tissues. About 60% of DEGs were assigned to known gene ontology (GO) categories. The genes were involved in transmembrane protein function, photosynthesis, carbohydrate metabolism, defense against oxidative damage, cell wall modification and protection against lipid peroxidation. Ion binding was found to be a key molecular activity for salt tolerance in alfalfa under salt stress. Conclusion The identified DEGs are significant for understanding the genetic basis of salt tolerance in alfalfa. The generated genomic information is useful for molecular marker development for alfalfa genetic improvement for salt tolerance.


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