Arabidopsis Thaliana NGATHA1 Transcription Factor Induces ABA Biosynthesis by Activating NCED3 Gene During Dehydration Stress
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Arabidopsis thaliana NGATHA1 transcription factor induces ABA biosynthesis by activating NCED3 gene during dehydration stress Hikaru Satoa,1, Hironori Takasakia,2, Fuminori Takahashia, Takamasa Suzukib, Satoshi Iuchic, Nobutaka Mitsudad, Masaru Ohme-Takagid,e, Miho Ikedad,e, Mitsunori Seof, Kazuko Yamaguchi-Shinozakig, and Kazuo Shinozakia,1 aGene Discovery Research Group, RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science, Tsukuba, 305-0074 Ibaraki, Japan; bCollege of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Chubu University, Kasugai, 487-8501 Aichi, Japan; cExperimental Plant Division, BioResource Research Center, RIKEN, Tsukuba, 305-0074 Ibaraki, Japan; dPlant Gene Regulation Research Group, Bioproduction Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Tsukuba, 305-8566 Ibaraki, Japan; eGraduate School of Science and Engineering, Saitama University, Saitama, 338-8570 Saitama, Japan; fDormancy and Adaptation Research Unit, RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science, Yokohama, 230-0045 Kanagawa, Japan; and gLaboratory of Plant Molecular Physiology, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Tokyo, 113-8657 Tokyo, Japan Edited by Julian I. Schroeder, Cell and Developmental Biology Section, Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, and approved October 1, 2018 (received for review July 10, 2018) The plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) is accumulated after the NCED3 gene is highly induced in the vascular tissues by drought stress and plays critical roles in the responses to drought drought stress, and its knockout mutants revealed decreased ABA stress in plants, such as gene regulation, stomatal closure, seed accumulation under drought-stress conditions and drought-stress- maturation, and dormancy. Although previous reports revealed sensitive phenotypes (10, 11). The NCED3 promoter has a G-box detailed molecular roles of ABA in stress responses, the factors sequence as a long-range enhancer that is essential for gene in- that contribute to the drought-stress responses—in particular, reg- duction in the vascular tissues during dehydration stress (12, 13). ulation of ABA accumulation—remain unclear. The enzyme NINE- This G-box is located ∼2.3 kb upstream from its translational start CIS-EPOXYCAROTENOID DIOXYGENASE 3 (NCED3) is essential for site; however, the detailed molecular mechanisms by which the ABA biosynthesis during drought stress, and the NCED3 gene is unidentified transcription factors activate the NCED3 gene before PLANT BIOLOGY highly induced by drought stress. In the present study, we isolated ABA accumulation have not been elucidated. In the present study, NCED3 NGATHAs (NGAs) as candidate transcriptional regulators of we identified a transcription factor, NGATHA1 (NGA1), that through a screen of a plant library harboring the transcription activates the NCED3 gene during dehydration stress and charac- factors fused to a chimeric repressor domain, SRDX. The NGA pro- terized a cis-acting sequence, NGA-binding element (NBE), in the teins were directly bound to a cis-element NGA-binding element ′ ′ ′ ′ NCED3 5 untranslated region (5 UTR) of the NCED3 promoter that is (NBE) in the 5 untranslated region (5 UTR) of the promoter necessary for gene induction (in this work, we use “promoter” and were suggested to be transcriptional activators of NCED3. to refer to the region upstream from the translational start site Among the single-knockout mutants of four NGA family genes, of a protein coding gene and include the 5′ UTR region). More- we found that the NGATHA1 (NGA1) knockout mutant was drought- over, it also was suggested that ABA-independent posttranslational stress-sensitive with a decreased expression level of NCED3 during de- hydration stress. These results suggested that NGA1 essentially func- tions as a transcriptional activator of NCED3 among the NGA family Significance proteins. Moreover, the NGA1 protein was degraded under non- stressed conditions, and dehydration stress enhanced the accu- The plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) is essential for drought- mulation of NGA1 proteins, even in ABA-deficient mutant plants, stress responses in plants, and its functions have been well indicating that there should be ABA-independent posttranslational studied; however, the detailed molecular mechanisms of ABA regulations. These findings emphasize the regulatory mechanisms of biosynthesis during early drought stress need to be further ABA biosynthesis during early drought stress. explored. The present study identified a transcription factor, NGTHA1 (NGA1), which positively regulates ABA accumulation drought stress | ABA biosynthesis | transcriptional regulation | NCED3 | during dehydration stress by activating the NCED3 gene encoding NGA a key ABA biosynthetic enzyme. We also identified a cis-acting element bound by NGA1 in the 5′ untranslated region (5′ UTR) NCED3 lants have developed various systems to survive adverse and of the promoter. The NGA1 protein was degraded under Pfluctuating environmental conditions, such as drought, high nonstressed conditions, but it was stabilized during dehydration salt, and extreme temperature, as sessile organisms. Drought stress in an ABA-independent pathway. stress has negative effects on the plant growth and crop yield (1) Author contributions: H.S., H.T., F.T., K.Y.-S., and K.S. designed research; H.S., H.T., T.S., and often causes severe damage to the agricultural crops (2). The and M.S. performed research; H.S., S.I., N.M., M.O.-T., and M.I. contributed new reagents/ plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) is known as an essential factor analytic tools; H.S., H.T., and T.S. analyzed data; and H.S. and K.S. wrote the paper. that positively regulates the plant drought-stress responses, such as The authors declare no conflict of interest. stomatal closure, induction of drought-inducible genes, and re- This article is a PNAS Direct Submission. pression of plant growth (3). Previous studies revealed the de- Published under the PNAS license. tailed molecular mechanisms by which ABA is transported (4), Data deposition: Transcriptome datasets have been deposited in the DNA Data Bank of received (5) to activate the cellular signal cascades (6, 7), and then Japan (accession no. DRA006360). induces drought-stress-responsive gene expression (8); however, 1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: [email protected] or kazuo. the factors that regulate early drought-stress responses before [email protected]. ABA accumulation need to be further explored. 2Present address: Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Saitama University, Sai- Among the various enzymatic proteins involved in several ABA bio- tama, 338-8570 Saitama, Japan. synthetic pathways in plants (9), NINE-CIS-EPOXYCAROTENOID This article contains supporting information online at www.pnas.org/lookup/suppl/doi:10. DIOXYGENASE 3 (NCED3) is known as an important enzyme 1073/pnas.1811491115/-/DCSupplemental. for ABA accumulation during drought stress because expression of www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1811491115 PNAS Latest Articles | 1of10 Downloaded by guest on September 29, 2021 regulation should be involved in the stabilization of the NGA1 NCED3 knockout mutants (nc3-2)(Fig.1E and F and SI Ap- protein. NGA proteins are B3-type transcription factors, and Ara- pendix,Fig.S1A–C). (In this work, “dehydration” and “drought” bidopsis thaliana has four NGA family proteins. Previous work stresses are defined as water-deficit stress treatments of plants on revealed that the NGA proteins regulate the developmental pro- parafilms from agar plates and plants on soil without a water cess in the reproductive organs or leaves (14–16). In the present supply, respectively.) ABA accumulation during dehydration stress work, we revealed functions of NGA1, which acts as a positive was significantly suppressed in line 1008-2 (Fig. 1G)inaccordwith regulator of ABA biosynthesis during the drought-stress responses the repression of NCED3 (Fig. 1D). The low level of ABA accu- by directly activating the expression of NCED3. mulation in nc3-2 likely results from low induction of another NCED family gene in nc3-2 that was not induced in the wild-type Results plant (21). Thus, we hypothesized that the NGA family proteins NGA2–SRDX-Overexpressing Plants Reveal Repressed Expression of are involved in the transcription of NCED3 during drought stress. NCED3. To identify the transcription factors that regulate ABA NGA proteins are B3-type transcription factors, and Arabi- biosynthesis during early drought responses, we screened a library dopsis thaliana has four NGA family proteins and three NGA- of transgenic plants overexpressing the transcription factors fused like (NGAL) family proteins (SI Appendix, Fig. S1D). RAV to the repressive domain SRDX (CRES-T; chimeric repressor subfamily proteins have the conserved B3 domain with high gene silencing technology) (17). ABA-deficient mutants have been homology to NGA; however, the protein structures are quite reported to show sucrose-insensitive phenotypes during germina- different because they also have conserved AP2 domains. An tion (18). Previous studies reported that sucrose or other sugar- amino acid sequence, K/RLFGV, was found in all of the NGA, insensitive mutants often carried mutations in the genes involved NGAL, and RAV subfamily proteins, which was reported as a in ABA biosynthesis (19, 20). Therefore, we screened 1,795 CRES- putative repressor motif (22). More comprehensive and detailed T plant lines of the