Lee Yeon Mi, Chae Geun Young, Kim Min Kyung, Kim Seungill
Department of Environmental Horticulture, University of Seoul, Seoul 02504, Korea.
Plants (Basel). 2021 May 21;10(6):1039. doi: 10.3390/plants10061039.
Aquaporins (AQPs) are known to have a vital role in water transport in all living organisms including agriculturally important crops, but a comprehensive genomic study of AQPs in pepper has not been implemented. Here, we updated previous gene annotations and generated a total of 259 AQP genes from five plants, including pepper. Phylogenetic and motif analyses revealed that a large proportion of pepper AQP genes belong to the specific subgroup of tonoplast intrinsic protein (TIP) subfamily, TIP4. Chromosomal localization and estimated duplication times illustrated that genes in TIP4 formed a tandem array on the short arm of chromosome 1, resulting from pepper-specific expansion after its divergence with species. Transcriptome analyses under various abiotic stress conditions revealed that transport-, photosystem-, and thylakoid-related genes were generally enriched in expression clusters containing AQP genes in pepper. These results provide valuable genomic resources and insight into the evolutionary mechanism that generate genomic diversity of the AQP gene family in pepper.
水通道蛋白（AQPs）在包括重要农作物在内的所有生物体的水分运输中起着至关重要的作用，但尚未对辣椒中的水通道蛋白进行全面的基因组研究。在此，我们更新了之前的基因注释，并从包括辣椒在内的五种植物中总共鉴定出259个水通道蛋白基因。系统发育和基序分析表明，辣椒水通道蛋白基因的很大一部分属于液泡膜内在蛋白（TIP）亚家族的特定亚组TIP4。染色体定位和估计的复制时间表明，TIP4中的基因在1号染色体短臂上形成串联阵列，这是辣椒与其他物种分化后特有的扩张所致。对各种非生物胁迫条件下的转录组分析表明，与运输、光系统和类囊体相关的基因通常在辣椒中含有水通道蛋白基因的表达簇中富集。这些结果提供了有价值的基因组资源，并深入了解了辣椒水通道蛋白基因家族产生基因组多样性的进化机制。
