Isolation and Identification of Some Genes for Drought Tolerance in Suaeda Sp Plant

Abstract

INTRODUCTION Environmental stress, such as low temperature, high temperature, high salinity, and drought restrict the distribution and productivity of plants. When subject to salt stress or drought, some vascular plants typically respond with increased accumulation of proline and glycine betaine, an important osmoprotectant that is produced in response to salt and other osmotic stresses Zhou et al., (2008). (Abd El-Maboud and Khalil 2013) detected an increase of glycine betaine and proline in Suaeda fruticosa and S. vera under salinity and drought stress. In higher plants, proline is synthesized from glutamate or arginine /ornithineIn higher plants, P5CS is encoded by a nuclear gene from Vigna aconitifolia (Hu et al., 1992), Arabidopsis thaliana (Strizhov et al., 1997), Glycine max and Lactuca sativa (Porcel et al., 2004) and other species. The last step in betaine synthesis in plants is catalyzed by betaine aldehyde dehydrogenase (BADH), a nuclearencoded chloroplastic enzyme. To date, BADHs have been isolated from several species, viz spinach (Spinacia oleracea L.) (Shirasawa et al., 2006), barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) (Nakamura et al., 2001) and mangrove (Avicennia marina) (Wu et al., 2008). The Dehydration-responsive element-binding proteins (DREBs) are members of the APETALA2/ethylene-responsive element-binding factor (AP2/ERF) family of transcription factors in the promoters of stress-inducible genes (Yamaguchi and Shinozaki 2006). Genes included in the DREB subfamily are divided into six small subgroups (A-1 to A-6) based on similarities in the binding domain. DREB from Salicornia brachiata was induced by NaCl, drought, and heat stress (Gupta et al., 2014). In the present study, three identified drought-responsive genes were detected in two Suaeda species in order to clarify their role in plant resistance.