A research team led by Prof. WU Lifang from Institute of Intelligent Machines, Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HFIPS) investigated the genetic regulation of red pigment formation in Chinese tallow leaves and identified an R2R3-MYB transcription factor SsMYB1, which positively regulates anthocyanin biosynthesis and determines leaf color in Chinese tallow, from Chinese tallow, a kind of ornamental tree widely planted in China.
"The effect of coloration of the Chinese tallow leaves is not as good as expected with the change of environment," said CHEN Xue, a researcher who joined the team, "That’s why we conducted the study to reveal the mechanism of the coloration of the Chinese tallow leaves."
In this research, they found that the anthocyanin content of Chinese tallow leaves was dependent on the expression of SsMYB1. Overexpressing the SsMYB1 in Arabidopsis showed higher anthocyanin contents, whereas silencing of SsMYB1 in the Chinese tallow leaves significantly reduced its accumulation.
The basic helix-loop-helix protein SsbHLH1 worked as a putative SsMYB1 co-regulator here. It directly interacted with SsMYB1 to regulate the anthocyanin biosynthetic pathway.
They also discovered that, compare with SsMYB1 alone, tobacco leaves transient overexpressing SsMYB1 and SsbHLH1 showed deeper red pigmentation. It proved that SsbHLH1 physically interacted with SsMYB1 to enhance anthocyanin biosynthesis. “After binding to the promoters of SsDFR1 and SsANS, SsMYB1 activated anthocyanin biosynthesis and promoted their transcription activity, which can be further enhanced by SsbHLH1.” explained CHEN Xue.
The identification and characterization of novel regulatory genes for leaf coloration of Chinese tallow in this research investigated the molecular mechanism of anthocyanin biosynthesis and paved way for the cultivation of new varities.
This work was funded by The National Key R&D Program of China, the key program of 13th five-year plan, HFIPS, Natural Science Foundation of Anhui province and the supplementary program of Science and Technology Service program of Chinese Academy of Sciences of Fujian province, the Project of Science and Technology Innovation Team in Anhui Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
Link to the paper: The R2R3-MYB transcription factor SsMYB1 positively regulates anthocyanin biosynthesis and determines leaf color in Chinese tallow (Sapium sebiferum Roxb.)
The R2R3-MYB transcription factor SsMYB1 positively regulates anthocyanin biosynthesis and determines leaf color in Chinese tallow (Sapium sebiferum Roxb.) (Image by CHEN Xue)
Contact:
ZHAO Weiwei
Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (http://english.hf.cas.cn/)
Email: annyzhao@ipp.ac.cn