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Analysis of a desiccation and ABA‐responsive promoter isolated from the resurrection plant Craterostigma plantagineum
Author(s) -
Michel Detlef,
Salamini Francesco,
Bartels Dorothea,
Dale Phyllis,
Baga Monica,
Szalay Aladar
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
the plant journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.058
H-Index - 269
eISSN - 1365-313X
pISSN - 0960-7412
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-313x.1993.04010029.x
Subject(s) - desiccation , biology , botany
The resurrection plant Craterostigma plantagineum can recover from severe desiccation within 24 h of contact with water, and it is used as a model system to analyse desiccation tolerance in higher plants. During drying or ABA treatment a specific set of transcripts accumulates rapidly in leaves and other tissues. In order to study transcriptional mechanisms of stress‐induced gene expression one gene (CDeT27‐45) was selected for promoter analysis. Chimeric gene fusions were constructed of the CDeT27‐45 promoter and β‐glucuronidase or luciferase. These constructs were tested in a homologous transient expression system which allowed the identification of promoter elements conferring ABA inducibility. By introducing the chimeric gene fusions into tobacco via Agrobacterium ‐mediated transformation we found that the promoter activity is under strict tissue‐specific and developmental control. In tobacco the promoter was only active in developing embryos and in mature pollen grains — two tissues which are naturally desiccation tolerant in tobacco. The specific temporal expression pattern was attributed to particular 5′ upstream sequences. The promoter analysis presented here should allow the separation of important regulatory components as a first step in dissecting events in the signal transduction chain.