The functional analysis of a wheat group 3 late embryogenesis abundant protein in Escherichia coli and Arabidopsis under abiotic stresses

ABSTRACT

Late embryogenesis abundant (LEA) proteins are highly hydrophilic and thermostable proteins that could be induced by abiotic stresses in plants. Previously, we have isolated a group 3 LEA gene WZY3-1 (GenBank: KX090360.1) in wheat. In this study, the recombinant plasmid with WZY3-1 was transformed into Escherichia coli BL21 for protein expression. Furthermore, we transformed WZY3-1 into Arabidopsis. Overexpression of WZY3-1 in E.coli enhanced their tolerance to mannitol and NaCl. WZY3-1 protein could protect lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) under freeze and heat stress. Overexpression of WZY3-1 showed that WZY3-1 could help to improve the drought tolerance of transgenic Arabidopsis. In summary, our works show that WZY3-1 plays an important role in abiotic stress resistance in prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms.

KEYWORDS:

• LEA protein
• drought stress
• NaCl stress
• transgenic Arabidopsis
• wheat

Authors’ contributions

LZ and ZY designed the study, wrote part of the manuscript, and finalized the figures. XW and YT carried out most of the experiments and data analysis and wrote part of the manuscript. ZY, XW, YT and DZ performed experiments and took care of plants. All authors have read and approved the manuscript.

Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This work was financially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China [31671608], and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [Z109021567].