The Apple Module Enhances Drought Stress Tolerance by Integrating Ascorbic Acid Metabolism.

Drought stress severely restricts crop yield and quality. Small noncoding RNAs play critical roles in plant growth, development, and stress responses by regulating target gene expression, but their roles in drought stress tolerance in apple () are poorly understood. Here, we identified various small noncoding RNAs and their targets from the wild apple species via high-throughput sequencing and degradome analysis. Forty known microRNAs (miRNAs) and eight new small noncoding RNAs were differentially expressed in response to 2 or 4 h of drought stress treatment. We experimentally verified the expression patterns of five selected miRNAs and their targets. We established that one miRNA, mdm-miR171i, specifically targeted and degraded - ( ) transcripts. Both knockout of - and overexpression of improved drought stress tolerance in the cultivated apple line 'GL-3' by regulating the expression of antioxidant enzyme genes, especially that of , which functions in metabolism under drought stress. Transient expression analysis demonstrated that MsSCL26.1 activates transcription by positively regulating the activity of the region in its promoter. Therefore, the - module enhances drought stress tolerance in apple by regulating antioxidant gene expression and ascorbic acid metabolism.