Transcriptome Profile Analysis of Arabidopsis Reveals the Drought Stress-Induced Long Non-coding RNAs Associated With Photosynthesis, Chlorophyll Synthesis, Fatty Acid Synthesis and Degradation

Abstract

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play an important role in the response of plants to drought stress. The previous studies have reported that overexpression of LEA3 and VOC could enhance drought tolerance and improve the oil content in Brassica napus and Arabidopsis thaliana, and most of the efforts have been invested in the gene function analysis, there is little understanding of how genes that involved in these important pathways are regulated. In the present study, the transcriptomic results of LEA3 and VOC over-expressed (OE) lines were compared with the RNAi lines, mutant lines and control lines under long-term and short-term drought treatment, a series of differentially expressed lncRNAs were identified, and their regulation patterns in mRNA were also investigated in above mentioned materials. The regulation of the target genes of differentially expressed lncRNAs on plant biological functions was studied. It was revealed that the mutant lines had less drought-response related lncRNAs than that of the OE lines. Functional analysis demonstrated that multiple genes were involved in the carbon-fixing and chlorophyll metabolism, such as CDR1, CHLM, and CH1, were regulated by the upregulated lncRNA in OE lines. In LEA-OE, AT4G13180 that promotes the fatty acid synthesis was regulated by five lncRNAs that were upregulated under both long-term and short-term drought treatments. The key genes, including of SHM1, GOX2, and GS2, in the methylglyoxal synthesis pathway were all regulated by a number of down-regulated lncRNAs in OE lines, thereby reducing the content of such harmful compounds produced under stress in plants. This study identified a series of lncRNAs related to the pathways that affect photosynthesis, chlorophyll synthesis, fatty acid synthesis, degradation, and other important effects on drought resistance and oil content. The present study provided a series of lncRNAs for further improvement of crop varieties, especially drought resistant and oil content traits.

Targeted and untargeted metabolomics reveals deep analysis of drought stress responses in needles and roots of Pinus taeda seedlings

“…Thus glutamate showed important roles in P. taeda seedlings under drought stress. Furthermore, glutamate acts as a neurotransmitter in plants, its receptor GLR3.7 in Arabidopsis is involved in ABA response ( Chen et al., 2021 ). Therefore, glutamate enrichment improved drought tolerance, performing together with ABA signaling in P. taeda under drought stress.…”

Analysis of LncRNA43234-Associated ceRNA Network Reveals Oil Metabolism in Soybean

“…20 Moreover, overexpression of late embryogenesis abundant group 3 (LEA3) improved the oil content in B. napus and A. thaliana, and in LEA3-overexpressed lines, lncRNAs regulated the AT4G13180 for fatty acid synthesis. 21 lncRNAs act as microRNA (miRNA) sponges in the regulation of target mRNAs of miRNAs, thus participating in the development of plants. 22 Through the transcriptome sequencing of two peony cultivars with different fatty acid contents, nine miRNAs and 39 lncRNAs were predicted to target lipid-related genes.…”

“…napus and A. thaliana, and in LEA3-overexpressed lines, lncRNAs regulated the AT4G13180 for fatty acid synthesis …”

Genome-wide analysis of long non-coding RNAs in sugar beet (Beta vulgaris L.) under drought stress

“…Hormonal modulation also represents a critical factor that induces water deficiency resistance in plants ( Merlaen et al., 2020 ). Therefore, plants can achieve drought adaption by modulate several pathways, among which noncoding RNAs play essential roles ( Chen et al., 2021b ).…”