Li Yang, Xing Yijing, Jin Ruohan, Li Luyu, Huang Mengwei, Li Meng, Cui Dandan, Xiao Huaijuan, Li Shengli, Li Juanqi
Henan Agricultural University, Zhengzhou, Henan, 450002, China.
BMC Plant Biol. 2025 Aug 30;25(1):1163. doi: 10.1186/s12870-025-07203-4.
Nodule inception-like Protein (NLP) family genes, as transcription factors, play an important role in regulating physiological responses of plants to adapt to external nitrogen environment changes. However, there are few reports on NLP genes in cucumber.
In this study, we identified members of the cucumber family, conducted a comprehensive bioinformatics analysis of them, analyzed their evolutionary relationships, and predicted their potential functions. The results showed that there were 3 homologous genes in cucumber. The evolutionary analysis of NLPs in different species showed that the NLP family proteins mostly contained three conserved domains: RWP-RK, PB-1 and GAF-like domains. All of them contained four introns and five exons, and the motif composition and protein structure were similar. By analyzing the promoter region, it was found that the cucumber NLP gene family contains cis-acting elements related to plant growth, environmental stress and hormone signaling, suggesting that this gene family may be involved in the growth and development of cucumber under stress and stress response. The cucumber NLP family genes were expressed in root, stem, leaf, flower, NLP and fruit tissues, and the CsNLP2 gene showed the highest expression in leaves. Interestingly, family genes respond to both nitrogen environment changesand abiotic stresses, especially CsNLP2. Further subcellular localization analysis showed that CsNLP2 was mainly located in the nucleus. The CsNLP2 transcription factor positively regulates the expression of CsNRT2.3 gene, which encodes the nitrate transporter. Overall, CsNLP2 was a strong candidate gene for improving nitrogen use efficiency in cucumber.
结节起始样蛋白（NLP）家族基因作为转录因子，在调节植物生理反应以适应外部氮环境变化方面发挥着重要作用。然而，关于黄瓜中NLP基因的报道较少。
在本研究中，我们鉴定了黄瓜家族的成员，对它们进行了全面的生物信息学分析，分析了它们的进化关系，并预测了它们的潜在功能。结果表明，黄瓜中有3个同源基因。不同物种中NLP的进化分析表明，NLP家族蛋白大多包含三个保守结构域：RWP-RK、PB-1和类GAF结构域。它们都含有四个内含子和五个外显子，基序组成和蛋白质结构相似。通过对启动子区域的分析，发现黄瓜NLP基因家族含有与植物生长、环境胁迫和激素信号相关的顺式作用元件，表明该基因家族可能参与黄瓜在胁迫下的生长发育和胁迫反应。黄瓜NLP家族基因在根、茎、叶、花、NLP和果实组织中表达，CsNLP2基因在叶片中表达最高。有趣的是，家族基因对氮环境变化和非生物胁迫都有响应，尤其是CsNLP2。进一步的亚细胞定位分析表明，CsNLP2主要位于细胞核中。CsNLP2转录因子正向调节编码硝酸盐转运蛋白的CsNRT2.3基因的表达。总体而言，CsNLP2是提高黄瓜氮利用效率的一个有力候选基因。
