scholarly journals Natural Genetic Resources from Diverse Plants to Improve Abiotic Stress Tolerance in Plants

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (22) ◽  
pp. 8567
Author(s):  
Seher Yolcu ◽  
Hemasundar Alavilli ◽  
Byeong-ha Lee

The current agricultural system is biased for the yield increase at the cost of biodiversity. However, due to the loss of precious genetic diversity during domestication and artificial selection, modern cultivars have lost the adaptability to cope with unfavorable environments. There are many reports on variations such as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and indels in the stress-tolerant gene alleles that are associated with higher stress tolerance in wild progenitors, natural accessions, and extremophiles in comparison with domesticated crops or model plants. Therefore, to gain a better understanding of stress-tolerant traits in naturally stress-resistant plants, more comparative studies between the modern crops/model plants and crop progenitors/natural accessions/extremophiles are required. In this review, we discussed and summarized recent progress on natural variations associated with enhanced abiotic stress tolerance in various plants. By applying the recent biotechniques such as the CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing tool, natural genetic resources (i.e., stress-tolerant gene alleles) from diverse plants could be introduced to the modern crop in a non-genetically modified way to improve stress-tolerant traits.

Plants ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (10) ◽  
pp. 1374
Author(s):  
Adnan Younis ◽  
Fahad Ramzan ◽  
Yasir Ramzan ◽  
Faisal Zulfiqar ◽  
Muhammad Ahsan ◽  
...  

Plants endure many abiotic stresses, such as temperature (heat or frost), drought, and salt. Such factors are primary and frequent stressors that reduce agriculture crop yields. Often alterations in nutrient management and constituents, along with variations in biosynthetic capacity, ultimately reduce or halt plant growth. Genetically, stress is an environmental condition that interferes with complete genetic expression. A vast range of molecular genomic markers is available for the analysis of agricultural crops. These markers are classified into various groups based on how the markers are used: RAPD (Random amplified polymorphic DNA) markers serve to identify and screen hybrids based on salinity and drought stress tolerance, while simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers are excellent for the assessment of stress tolerance. Such markers also play an important role in the QTL (Quantitative trait loci) mapping of stress-related genes. Dehydrins for drought and saltol for salinity stresses are primitive genes which regulate responses to these conditions. Further, a focus on traits using single-gene single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) markers supports genetic mapping and the sequencing of stress-related traits in inbred lines. DNA markers facilitate marker-assisted breeding to enhance abiotic stress tolerance using advanced techniques and marker modification.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phumzile Mkhize ◽  
Jacob Mashilo ◽  
Hussein Shimelis

Bottle gourd [Lagenaria siceraria (Molina) Standl.] is an important multi-purpose cucurbit crop grown for its leaf, fruit, and seed. It is widely cultivated and used for human consumption in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) providing vital human nutrition and serving as food security crop. There is wide genetic variation among bottle gourd genetic resources in Africa for diverse qualitative and quantitative attributes for effective variety design, product development, and marketing. However, the crop is under- researched and -utilized, and improved varieties are yet to be developed and commercialized in the region. Therefore, the objective of this review is to provide the progress on bottle gourd genetic improvement and genetic analysis targeting agronomic and horticultural attributes, nutritional composition, biotic, and abiotic stress tolerance to guide current and future cultivar development, germplasm access, and conservation in SSA. The first section of the paper presents progress on breeding of bottle gourd for horticultural traits, agronomic performance, nutritional and anti-nutritional composition, and biotic and abiotic stress tolerance. This is followed by important highlights on key genetic resources of cultivated and wild bottle gourd for demand driven breeding. Lastly, the review summaries advances in bottle gourd genomics, genetic engineering and genome editing. Information presented in this paper should aid bottle gourd breeders and agronomists to develop and deploy new generation and promising varieties with farmer- and market -preferred attributes.


2018 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 259-265 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hemant B Kardile ◽  
◽  
Vikrant ◽  
Nirmal Kant Sharma ◽  
Ankita Sharma ◽  
...  

Genes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Antt Htet Wai ◽  
Muhammad Waseem ◽  
A B M Mahbub Morshed Khan ◽  
Ujjal Kumar Nath ◽  
Do Jin Lee ◽  
...  

Protein disulfide isomerases (PDI) and PDI-like proteins catalyze the formation and isomerization of protein disulfide bonds in the endoplasmic reticulum and prevent the buildup of misfolded proteins under abiotic stress conditions. In the present study, we conducted the first comprehensive genome-wide exploration of the PDI gene family in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.). We identified 19 tomato PDI genes that were unevenly distributed on 8 of the 12 tomato chromosomes, with segmental duplications detected for 3 paralogous gene pairs. Expression profiling of the PDI genes revealed that most of them were differentially expressed across different organs and developmental stages of the fruit. Furthermore, most of the PDI genes were highly induced by heat, salt, and abscisic acid (ABA) treatments, while relatively few of the genes were induced by cold and nutrient and water deficit (NWD) stresses. The predominant expression of SlPDI1-1, SlPDI1-3, SlPDI1-4, SlPDI2-1, SlPDI4-1, and SlPDI5-1 in response to abiotic stress and ABA treatment suggested they play regulatory roles in abiotic stress tolerance in tomato in an ABA-dependent manner. Our results provide new insight into the structure and function of PDI genes and will be helpful for the selection of candidate genes involved in fruit development and abiotic stress tolerance in tomato.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (13) ◽  
pp. 7235
Author(s):  
Md. Tahjib-Ul-Arif ◽  
Mst. Ishrat Zahan ◽  
Md. Masudul Karim ◽  
Shahin Imran ◽  
Charles T. Hunter ◽  
...  

Several recent studies have shown that citric acid/citrate (CA) can confer abiotic stress tolerance to plants. Exogenous CA application leads to improved growth and yield in crop plants under various abiotic stress conditions. Improved physiological outcomes are associated with higher photosynthetic rates, reduced reactive oxygen species, and better osmoregulation. Application of CA also induces antioxidant defense systems, promotes increased chlorophyll content, and affects secondary metabolism to limit plant growth restrictions under stress. In particular, CA has a major impact on relieving heavy metal stress by promoting precipitation, chelation, and sequestration of metal ions. This review summarizes the mechanisms that mediate CA-regulated changes in plants, primarily CA’s involvement in the control of physiological and molecular processes in plants under abiotic stress conditions. We also review genetic engineering strategies for CA-mediated abiotic stress tolerance. Finally, we propose a model to explain how CA’s position in complex metabolic networks involving the biosynthesis of phytohormones, amino acids, signaling molecules, and other secondary metabolites could explain some of its abiotic stress-ameliorating properties. This review summarizes our current understanding of CA-mediated abiotic stress tolerance and highlights areas where additional research is needed.


Plants ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 173
Author(s):  
Abeer F. Desouky ◽  
Ahmed H. Ahmed ◽  
Hartmut Stützel ◽  
Hans-Jörg Jacobsen ◽  
Yi-Chen Pao ◽  
...  

Pathogenesis-related (PR) proteins are known to play relevant roles in plant defense against biotic and abiotic stresses. In the present study, we characterize the response of transgenic faba bean (Vicia faba L.) plants encoding a PR10a gene from potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) to salinity and drought. The transgene was under the mannopine synthetase (pMAS) promoter. PR10a-overexpressing faba bean plants showed better growth than the wild-type plants after 14 days of drought stress and 30 days of salt stress under hydroponic growth conditions. After removing the stress, the PR10a-plants returned to a normal state, while the wild-type plants could not be restored. Most importantly, there was no phenotypic difference between transgenic and non-transgenic faba bean plants under well-watered conditions. Evaluation of physiological parameters during salt stress showed lower Na+-content in the leaves of the transgenic plants, which would reduce the toxic effect. In addition, PR10a-plants were able to maintain vegetative growth and experienced fewer photosystem changes under both stresses and a lower level of osmotic stress injury under salt stress compared to wild-type plants. Taken together, our findings suggest that the PR10a gene from potato plays an important role in abiotic stress tolerance, probably by activation of stress-related physiological processes.


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