Acta Agriculturae Zhejiangensis ›› 2024, Vol. 36 ›› Issue (11): 2501-2509.DOI: 10.3969/j.issn.1004-1524.20240485

• Horticultural Science • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Cloning of AcWRKY94 gene from kiwifruit and its functional analysis under salt stress

GAO Jing1,2(), LU Linghong2, GU Xianbin2, FAN Fei2, SONG Genhua2, ZHANG Huiqin2,*()   

  1. 1. College of Life Sciences, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua 321004, Zhejiang, China
    2. Institute of Horticulture, Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Hangzhou 310021, China
  • Received:2024-06-05 Online:2024-11-25 Published:2024-11-27

Abstract:

In order to clarify the function of AcWRKY94 under salt stress, the WRKY transcription factor AcWRKY94 was cloned from ‘Hongyang’ kiwifruit. Bioinformatics analysis of AcWRKY94 was carried out using relevant websites and biological software. The expression of AcWRKY94 under salt treatment was analyzed. AcWRKY94 was overexpressed in Nicotiana benthamiana by Agrobacterium-mediated transgenic technology, and the salt tolerance of transgenic tobacco plants were analyzed. The results showed that the open reading frame of the AcWRKY94 was 906 bp and encoded 301 amino acids. Promoter sequence analysis revealed that AcWRKY94 might respond to a variety of signals such as abscisic acid, salicylic acid, methyl jasmonate, gibberellin, drought, and anaerobic. Multiple sequence alignment and phylogenetic tree analysis showed that the homologous sequences of AcWRKY94 and several species contain a WRKYGQK conserved domain and a C2HC zinc finger structure, which belong to WRKY Group III. Among them, the kiwifruit AcWRKY94 was closely related to the CsWRKY70-like proteins of tea plant. Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis showed that the expression of AcWRKY94 in roots of kiwifruit was significantly induced by salt treatment. After salt treatment, compared with wild type tobacco, the resistance of AcWRKY94-overexpressed line to salt was significantly enhanced, the content of malondialdehyde (MDA) and H2O2 decreased significantly, the content of proline (Pro) increased significantly, and the activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase (POD) and catalase (CAT) increased significantly. The above results suggested that AcWRKY94 could be induced by salt stress and might be involved in the regulation of salt resistance in kiwifruit.

Key words: kiwifruit, WRKY, salt stress, function

CLC Number: