Systematic Analysis of Galactinol Synthase and Raffinose Synthase Gene Families in Potato and Their Expression Patterns in Development and Abiotic Stress Responses

Abstract

Raffinose family oligosaccharides (RFOs) are very important for plant growth, development, and abiotic stress tolerance. Galactinol synthase (GolS) and raffinose synthase (RFS) are critical enzymes involved in RFO biosynthesis. However, the whole-genome identification and stress responses of their coding genes in potato remain unexplored. In this study, four StGolS and nine StRFS genes were identified and classified into three and five subgroups, respectively. Remarkably, a total of two StGolS and four StRFS genes in potato were identified to form collinear pairs with those in both Arabidopsis and tomato, respectively. Subsequent analysis revealed that StGolS4 exhibited significantly high expression levels in transport-related tissues, PEG-6000, and ABA treatments, with remarkable upregulation under salt stress. Additionally, StRFS5 showed similar responses to StGolS4, but StRFS4 and StRFS8 gene expression increased significantly under salt treatment and decreased in PEG-6000 and ABA treatments. Overall, these results lay a foundation for further research on the functional characteristics and molecular mechanisms of these two gene families in response to ABA, salt, and drought stresses, and provide a theoretical foundation and new gene resources for the abiotic-stress-tolerant breeding of potato.

Characterization of Galactinol Synthase (Gols) Genes in Ipomoea Triloba and I. Trifida: An Approach Using Bioinformatics

“…According to the study by Fan et al (2017), no expression of GolS genes was observed in N. tabacum leaves. In contrast, the StGolS4 gene showed high expression levels in tissues related to transport, suggesting that this gene may play an important role in material transport in Solanum tuberosum L. (Jiang et al, 2023).…”

Transcriptomic and metabolomic profiling provide insight into the role of sugars and hormones in leaf senescence of Pinellia ternata

“…Interestingly, Ra nose family oligosaccharides (RFOs) are worthwhile for plant growth and development that function as osmoprotectants. GOLS and RFS are critical enzymes involved in RFO biosynthesis (Jing et al, 2023). The expression levels of UDP-glucose 4-epimerase-related genes UGE1, UGE5 and RFS6 in leaves of ES group, displayed higher expression levels compared to those in LS group.…”

Cadmium-Induced Changes in the Accumulation of Sugars and the PsGolS Transcript in Pisum sativum L.

“…The comprehensive analysis of RS and GolS gene families in kiwifruit (Actinidia chinensis and Actinidia eriantha) revealed that abiotic stresses strongly induced AcGolS1/2/4/8 and AcRS2/4/8/11 expression [68]. Similarly, the analysis conducted on potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) showed that StGolS4 exhibited significantly high expression levels after PEG-6000, and abscisic acid (ABA) treatments, and under salt stress [69]. Furthermore, it was found that all four isoforms of CsGolS in the cucumber genome were also upregulated by salt, drought, cold, and heat [70].…”

“…Nonetheless, the knowledge of the Cd-induced signalling pathway that leads to an increase in galactinol and raffinose levels is still limited. Data show that ABA or reactive oxygen species (ROS) mediate the activity of GolS on an mRNA or protein basis [69,[73][74][75][76]. The role of ABA in Cd response is not well-established [77].…”