Overexpression of AmDUF1517 enhanced tolerance to salinity, drought, and cold stress in transgenic cotton

Abstract

As abiotic stresses become more severe as a result of global climate changes, the growth and development of plants are restricted. In the development of agricultural crops with greater stress tolerance, AmDUF1517 had been isolated from the highly stress-tolerant shrub Ammopiptanthus mongolicus, and can significantly enhance stress tolerance when inserted in Arabidopsis thaliana. In this study, we inserted this gene into cotton to analyze its potential for conferring stress tolerance. Two independent transgenic cotton lines were used. Southern blot analyses indicated that AmDUF1517 was integrated into the cotton genome. Physiological analysis demonstrated that AmDUF1517-transgenic cotton had stronger resistance than the control when treated with salt, drought, and cold stresses. Further analysis showed that trans-AmDUF1517 cotton displayed significantly higher antioxidant enzyme (superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase (POD), catalase (CAT), and glutathione S-transferase (GST)) activity and less reactive oxygen species (ROS) accumulation, which suggests that overexpression of AmDUF1517 can improve cotton resistance to stress by maintaining ROS homeostasis, as well as by alleviating cell membrane injury. These results imply that AmDUF1517 is a candidate gene in improving cotton resistance to abiotic stress.

Keywords

• transgenic cotton
• stress tolerance
• AmDUF1517, Ammopiptanthus mongolicus
• reactive oxygen species