Transcription Factor TaMYB30 Activates Wheat Wax Biosynthesis.

The waxy cuticle covers a plant's aerial surface and contributes to environmental adaptation in land plants. Although past decades have seen great advances in understanding wax biosynthesis in model plants, the mechanisms underlying wax biosynthesis in crop plants such as bread wheat remain to be elucidated. In this study, wheat MYB transcription factor TaMYB30 was identified as a transcriptional activator positively regulating wheat wax biosynthesis. The knockdown of expression using virus-induced gene silencing led to attenuated wax accumulation, increased water loss rates, and enhanced chlorophyll leaching. Furthermore, and were isolated as essential components of wax biosynthetic machinery in bread wheat. In addition, silencing and resulted in compromised wax biosynthesis and potentiated cuticle permeability. Importantly, we showed that TaMYB30 could directly bind to the promoter regions of and genes by recognizing the and cis-elements, and activate their expressions. These results collectively demonstrated that TaMYB30 positively regulates wheat wax biosynthesis presumably via the transcriptional activation of and .