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Waterlogging tolerance and wood properties of transgenic Populus alba × glandulosa expressing Vitreoscilla hemoglobin gene (Vgb)

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Abstract

Because overexpression of Vitreoscilla hemoglobin gene (Vgb) gene in plants can enhance tolerance to waterlogging, here Vgb was inserted into Populus alba × glandulosa to investigate its expression and effects on growth and physiological responses to waterlogging stress in the transgenic poplars. Southern blotting and RT-PCR analysis of Vgb-transgenic P. alba × glandulosa showed that the Vgb gene was integrated into the genome of the V13-81 and V13-85 transgenic lines and expressed. In greenhouse waterlogging stress tests, mortality of the transgenic poplar was significant lower than that of nontransgenic plants with increasing treatment time from 2 to 22 days. The transgenic plants had higher chlorophyll content and less chloroplast damage than in the control plants. Additionally, starch accumulation increased, and growth was enhanced in the transgenic plants, suggesting that the Vgb-expressing lines had improved energy reserves. Field trials of the transgenic poplar suggested that Vgb expression promotes growth and influences wood quality. Taken together, our results suggest that the expression of Vgb can increase the accumulation of chlorophyll and starch in the transgenic poplar, improve its ability to endure flooding, and improve growth and wood quality of the transgenic plants.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Tree Genetics and Breeding, Research Institute of Forestry, Chinese Academy of Forestry, Beijing, 100091, People’s Republic of China

    Yiliang Li, Weixi Zhang, Bingyu Zhang, Qinjun Huang & Xiaohua Su

  2. Key Laboratory of Tree Breeding and Cultivation, National Forestry and Grassland Administration, Beijing, 100091, People’s Republic of China

    Yiliang Li, Weixi Zhang, Bingyu Zhang, Qinjun Huang & Xiaohua Su

  3. Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Silviculture, Protection and Utilization, Guangzhou, 510520, People’s Republic of China

    Yiliang Li

  4. Guangdong Academy of Forestry, Guangzhou, 510520, People’s Republic of China

    Yiliang Li

  5. College of Forestry, Shenyang Agricultural University, 120 Dongling Street, Shengyang, 110866, People’s Republic of China

    Wenxu Zhu

Authors
  1. Yiliang Li
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  2. Weixi Zhang
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  3. Wenxu Zhu
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  4. Bingyu Zhang
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  5. Qinjun Huang
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  6. Xiaohua Su
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Contributions

YL Li and WX Zhang projected and implemented all the experiments and drafted the manuscript. YL Li and WX Zhang are contributed equally to this work. XH Su, WX Zhu, BY Zhang, QJ Huang were involved in devising and directing the experiments and proofreading the manuscript. XH Su contributed to the concept of the research, gave constructive advice on the experiments, and finally completed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Xiaohua Su.

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Project funding: The work was supported by the Basic Research Fund of RIF (Grant No. CAFYBB2017ZA001-3) the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 31700589) and the Forestry Genetic Breeding National Key Laboratory (Chinese Academy of Forestry Sciences) Open Project (Grant No. TGB 2013005).

The online version is available at http://www.springerlink.com

Corresponding editor: Tao Xu.

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Li, Y., Zhang, W., Zhu, W. et al. Waterlogging tolerance and wood properties of transgenic Populus alba × glandulosa expressing Vitreoscilla hemoglobin gene (Vgb). J. For. Res. 32, 831–839 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11676-020-01121-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11676-020-01121-x

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