Overexpression of GmFDL19 enhances tolerance to drought and salt stresses in soybean

PLoS One. 2017 Jun 22;12(6):e0179554. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0179554. eCollection 2017.

Abstract

The basic leucine zipper (bZIP) family of transcription factors plays an important role in the growth and developmental process as well as responds to various abiotic stresses, such as drought and high salinity. Our previous work identified GmFDL19, a bZIP transcription factor, as a flowering promoter in soybean, and the overexpression of GmFDL19 caused early flowering in transgenic soybean plants. Here, we report that GmFDL19 also enhances tolerance to drought and salt stress in soybean. GmFDL19 was determined to be a group A member, and its transcription expression was highly induced by abscisic acid (ABA), polyethylene glycol (PEG 6000) and high salt stresses. Overexpression of GmFDL19 in soybean enhanced drought and salt tolerance at the seedling stage. The relative plant height (RPH) and relative shoot dry weight (RSDW) of transgenic plants were significantly higher than those of the WT after PEG and salt treatments. In addition, the germination rate and plant height of the transgenic soybean were also significantly higher than that of WT plants after various salt treatments. Furthermore, we also found that GmFDL19 could reduce the accumulation of Na+ ion content and up-regulate the expression of several ABA/stress-responsive genes in transgenic soybean. We also found that GmFDL19 overexpression increased the activities of several antioxidative enzyme and chlorophyll content but reduced malondialdehyde content. These results suggested that GmFDL19 is involved in soybean abiotic stress responses and has potential utilization to improve multiple stress tolerance in transgenic soybean.

MeSH terms

  • Basic-Leucine Zipper Transcription Factors / genetics*
  • Droughts*
  • Gene Expression
  • Glycine max / drug effects
  • Glycine max / genetics*
  • Glycine max / physiology*
  • Plant Proteins / genetics*
  • Plants, Genetically Modified
  • Salts / pharmacology*
  • Stress, Physiological / drug effects
  • Stress, Physiological / genetics*

Substances

  • Basic-Leucine Zipper Transcription Factors
  • Plant Proteins
  • Salts

Grants and funding

This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grants 31430065, 31371643, and 31571686), the Open Foundation of the Key Laboratory of Soybean Molecular Design Breeding, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Strategic Action Plan for Science and Technology Innovation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA08030108) to B. Liu and F. Kong; the Heilongjiang Natural Science Foundation of China [ZD201001, JC201313]; the Research and Development of Applied Technology Project, Harbin [2014RFQY055].