Utilization of a floral organ-expressing AP1 promoter for generation of new floral traits in Torenia fournieri Lind

To establish an efficient way to create novel floral traits in horticultural flowers, we have introduced many chimeric repressors of Arabidopsis transcription factors into torenia. Among them, we found a transgenic torenia exhibiting unopened flower buds and glossy dark green leaves with curled margins as a consequence of overexpression of Arabidopsis MYB24 with a transcriptional repression domain (MYB24-SRDX). Petals inside the flower buds exhibited a distinct coloration pattern. To bring out this favorable petal trait without inducing the unfavorable phenotypes due to the constitutive expression of chimeric repressors by the cauliflower mosaic virus 35S (35S) promoter, we tested the ability of a floral organ-specific Arabidopsis APETALA1 (AP1) promoter, which was found to be active in both petals and flower buds of torenia. As expected, AP1 pro:MYB24-SRDX transgenic torenias resulted in the opening of flowers and a normal leaf phenotype. Furthermore, these AP1 pro:MYB24-SRDX torenias exhibited wavy petals with a characteristic configuration. This is a good example of the utilization of a floral organ-specific promoter for creating distinct flower phenotypes without causing unfavorable morphological and physiological changes in other organs.

[1]  Nobutaka Mitsuda,et al.  Efficient production of novel floral traits in torenia by collective transformation with chimeric repressors of Arabidopsis transcription factors , 2011 .

[2]  Yoshikazu Tanaka,et al.  The new FioreDB database provides comprehensive information on plant transcription factors and phenotypes induced by CRES-T in ornamental and model plants , 2011 .

[3]  N. Ohtsubo.  Beyond the blue rose: Modification of floral architecture with plant-specific chimeric repressors , 2011 .

[4]  Masahito Shikata,et al.  Functional divergence within class B MADS-box genes TfGLO and TfDEF in Torenia fournieri Lind , 2010, Molecular Genetics and Genomics.

[5]  E. Grotewold,et al.  MYB transcription factors in Arabidopsis. , 2002, Trends in plant science.

[6]  A. Aharoni,et al.  TOMATO AGAMOUS-LIKE 1 is a component of the fruit ripening regulatory network. , 2009, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[7]  Nobutaka Mitsuda,et al.  Functional analysis of transcription factors in Arabidopsis. , 2009, Plant & cell physiology.

[8]  Kerstin Kaufmann,et al.  In planta localisation patterns of MADS domain proteins during floral development in Arabidopsis thaliana , 2009, BMC Plant Biology.

[9]  A. Mandaokar,et al.  MYB108 Acts Together with MYB24 to Regulate Jasmonate-Mediated Stamen Maturation in Arabidopsis1[OA] , 2008, Plant Physiology.

[10]  A. Shinmyō,et al.  Improved translation efficiency in chrysanthemum and torenia with a translational enhancer derived from the tobacco alcohol dehydrogenase gene , 2008 .

[11]  K. Hiratsu,et al.  Chimeric AGAMOUS repressor induces serrated petal phenotype in Torenia fournieri similar to that induced by cytokinin application , 2008 .

[12]  T. Nakatsuka,et al.  FioreDB: a database of phenotypic information induced by the chimeric repressor silencing technology (CRES-T) in Arabidopsis and floricultural plants , 2008 .

[13]  M. Shibata.  Importance of genetic transformation in ornamental plant breeding , 2008 .

[14]  Yoshikazu Tanaka,et al.  Engineering of the rose flavonoid biosynthetic pathway successfully generated blue-hued flowers accumulating delphinidin. , 2007, Plant & cell physiology.

[15]  Zhang-liang Chen,et al.  Over-expression of a flower-specific transcription factor gene AtMYB24 causes aberrant anther development , 2007, Plant Cell Reports.

[16]  B. M. Lange,et al.  Transcriptional regulators of stamen development in Arabidopsis identified by transcriptional profiling. , 2006, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[17]  K. Yamaguchi-Shinozaki,et al.  Efficient production of male and female sterile plants by expression of a chimeric repressor in Arabidopsis and rice. , 2006, Plant biotechnology journal.

[18]  K. Apel,et al.  Comparison of different constitutive and inducible promoters for the overexpression of transgenes in Arabidopsis thaliana , 1995, Plant Molecular Biology.

[19]  K. Hiratsu,et al.  Dominant repression of target genes by chimeric repressors that include the EAR motif, a repression domain, in Arabidopsis. , 2003, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[20]  Yoshikazu Tanaka,et al.  A rationale for the shift in colour towards blue in transgenic carnation flowers expressing the flavonoid 3',5'-hydroxylase gene. , 2003, Phytochemistry.

[21]  G. Choi,et al.  AtMYB21, a gene encoding a flower-specific transcription factor, is regulated by COP1. , 2002, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[22]  R. Stracke,et al.  The R2R3-MYB gene family in Arabidopsis thaliana. , 2001, Current opinion in plant biology.

[23]  R. Aida,et al.  Transgenic Torenia fournieri Lind. (Torenia) , 2001 .

[24]  S. Clough,et al.  Floral dip: a simplified method for Agrobacterium-mediated transformation of Arabidopsis thaliana. , 1998, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[25]  J. Paz-Ares,et al.  More than 80R2R3-MYB regulatory genes in the genome of Arabidopsis thaliana. , 1998, The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology.

[26]  R. Aida,et al.  Agrobacterium -mediated Transformation of Torenia (Torenia fournieri) , 1995 .

[27]  Cindy Gustafson-Brown,et al.  Regulation of the arabidopsis floral homeotic gene APETALA1 , 1994, Cell.

[28]  D. Gallie.  Posttranscriptional Regulation of Gene Expression in Plants , 1993 .

[29]  Cindy Gustafson-Brown,et al.  Molecular characterization of the Arabidopsis floral homeotic gene APETALA1 , 1992, Nature.

[30]  Y. Arai,et al.  An improved assay for β-glucuronidase in transformed cells: methanol almost completely suppresses a putative endogenous β-glucuronidase activity. , 1990 .