Increased drought tolerance in plants engineered for low lignin and low xylan content

Biotechnology for Biofuels
Jingwei YanHenrik V Scheller

Abstract

We previously developed several strategies to engineer plants to produce cost-efficient biofuels from plant biomass. Engineered Arabidopsis plants with low xylan and lignin content showed normal growth and improved saccharification efficiency under standard growth conditions. However, it remains to be determined whether these engineered plants perform well under drought stress, which is the primary source of abiotic stress in the field. Upon exposing engineered Arabidopsis plants to severe drought, we observed better survival rates in those with a low degree of xylan acetylation, low lignin, and low xylan content compared to those in wild-type plants. Increased pectic galactan content had no effect on drought tolerance. The drought-tolerant plants exhibited low water loss from leaves, and drought-responsive genes (RD29A, RD29B, DREB2A) were generally up-regulated under drought stress, which did not occur in the well-watered state. When compared with the wild type, plants with low lignin due to expression of QsuB, a 3-dehydroshikimate dehydratase, showed a stronger response to abscisic acid (ABA) in assays for seed germination and stomatal closure. The low-lignin plants also accumulated more ABA in response to drought than the w...Continue Reading

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Citations

Apr 5, 2020·ChemSusChem·Nicholas E ThornburgGregg Beckham
Feb 28, 2021·Cell·Yuzhong LiuJay D Keasling
May 19, 2020·Journal of Plant Physiology·Ming-Qun LiHong-Hui Lin
Oct 14, 2021·Journal of Experimental Botany·Tallyta N SilvaJenny C Mortimer

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Methods Mentioned

BETA
acetylation
environmental stress
PCR

Software Mentioned

Leica
LAS X
ImageJ

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