Kant Pragya, Gordon Michal, Kant Surya, Zolla Gaston, Davydov Olga, Heimer Yair M, Chalifa-Caspi Vered, Shaked Ruth, Barak Simon
Albert Katz Department of Dryland Biotechnologies, Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Midreshet Ben-Gurion, 84990, Israel.
Plant Cell Environ. 2008 Jun;31(6):697-714. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3040.2008.01779.x. Epub 2008 Mar 4.
Abiotic stresses are a primary cause of crop loss worldwide. The convergence of stress signalling pathways to a common set of transcription factors suggests the existence of upstream regulatory genes that control plant responses to multiple abiotic stresses. To identify such genes, data from published Arabidopsis thaliana abiotic stress microarray analyses were combined with our presented global analysis of early heat stress-responsive gene expression, in a relational database. A set of Multiple Stress (MST) genes was identified by scoring each gene for the number of abiotic stresses affecting expression of that gene. ErmineJ over-representation analysis of the MST gene set identified significantly enriched gene ontology biological processes for multiple abiotic stresses and regulatory genes, particularly transcription factors. A subset of MST genes including only regulatory genes that were designated 'Multiple Stress Regulatory' (MSTR) genes, was identified. To validate this strategy for identifying MSTR genes, mutants of the highest-scoring MSTR gene encoding the circadian clock protein CCA1, were tested for altered sensitivity to stress. A double mutant of CCA1 and its structural and functional homolog, LATE ELONGLATED HYPOCOTYL, exhibited greater sensitivity to salt, osmotic and heat stress than wild-type plants. This work provides a reference data set for further study of MSTR genes.
非生物胁迫是全球作物减产的主要原因。胁迫信号通路汇聚到一组共同的转录因子表明，存在控制植物对多种非生物胁迫反应的上游调控基因。为了鉴定此类基因，已发表的拟南芥非生物胁迫微阵列分析数据与我们展示的早期热胁迫响应基因表达的全局分析数据在一个关系数据库中进行了整合。通过对每个基因受影响该基因表达的非生物胁迫数量进行评分，鉴定出一组多重胁迫（MST）基因。对MST基因集进行的ErmineJ过表达分析确定了多种非生物胁迫和调控基因（特别是转录因子）的基因本体生物学过程显著富集。鉴定出了一个仅包含被指定为“多重胁迫调控”（MSTR）基因的调控基因的MST基因子集。为了验证这种鉴定MSTR基因的策略，对编码生物钟蛋白CCA1的得分最高的MSTR基因的突变体进行了胁迫敏感性改变的测试。CCA1及其结构和功能同源物晚伸长下胚轴的双突变体比野生型植物对盐、渗透和热胁迫表现出更高的敏感性。这项工作为进一步研究MSTR基因提供了一个参考数据集。
