0The RsMYB1 transcription factor (TF) controls the regulation of anthocyanin in radish 1 1 (Raphanus sativus), and its overexpression in tobacco and petunia strongly enhances anthocyanin 1 2 production. However, no data exists on whether RsMYB1 is involved in the mechanism that 1 3 leads to abiotic stress tolerance. Under normal conditions, transgenic petunia plants expressing 1 4 RsMYB1 and WT were able to thrive by producing well-developed broad leaves and regular 1 5 roots. In contrast, a reduction in plant growth was observed when they were exposed to heavy 1 6 metals (CuSO 4 , ZnSO 4 , MnSO 4 , and K 2 Cr 2 O 7 ). However, RsMYB1-overexpressing plants were 1 7 found to be more tolerant to the stresses than the WT plants because the expressions of stress tolerant genes (GSH and PCs) and antioxidant genes (SOD, CAT, and POX) were enhanced. In addition, according to the phylogenetic analysis, RsMYB1 has a strong sequence similarity with 2 0 other MYB TFs that confer different abiotic stresses. These results suggest that overexpression 2 1 of RsMYB1 enhances the expression levels of metal-induced stress tolerance genes and 2 2 . CC-BY 4.0 International license It is made available under a (which was not peer-reviewed) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity.The copyright holder for this preprint . http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/286849 doi: bioRxiv preprint first posted online Mar. 22, 2018; antioxidant genes, and the resultant increase in gene expression improves heavy metal stress 2 3 tolerance in petunia.