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ARS Home » Plains Area » Lubbock, Texas » Cropping Systems Research Laboratory » Plant Stress and Germplasm Development Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #335050
Title: Co-overexpression of OsSIZ1 and AVP1 in cotton substantially improves cotton growth and development under multiple-stress conditions

Author
item ESMEILI, NARDANA - Texas Tech University
item SMITH, JENNIFER - Texas Tech University
item Burke, John
item Payton, Paxton
item ZHANG, HONG - Texas Tech University

Submitted to: National Cotton Council Beltwide Cotton Conference
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/4/2017
Publication Date: 1/4/2017
Citation: Esmeili, N., Smith, J., Burke, J.J., Payton, P.R., Zhang, H. 2017. Co-overexpression of OsSIZ1 and AVP1 in cotton substantially improves cotton growth and development under multiple-stress conditions. National Cotton Council Beltwide Cotton Conference, January 4-6, 2017, Dallas, TX. p. 29.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Environmental stresses such as salt, drought, and heat cause significant losses in crop production. Our laboratories employ genetic engineering to modify gene expression of selected genes to improve plant performance under environmental stress conditions. Previous studies by our group have shown that the overexpression of the rice gene OsSIZ1, a SUMO E3 ligase, resulted in improved heat- and drought-tolerance in cotton. In separated experiments, overexpression of an Arabidopsis vacuolar pyrophosphatase gene, AVP1, improved salt- and drought-tolerance in transgenic plants. We hypothesized that co-overexpression of OsSIZ1 and AVP1 in cotton would simultaneously confer higher heat-, drought-, and salt-tolerance in transgenic cotton and thus reduce loss in fiber yield under stressful growing environments. We introduced both AVP1 and OsSIZ1 into cotton and conducted preliminary experiments to test the performance of the AVP1/OsSIZ1-co-overexpressing cotton plants in laboratory and field conditions. We observed that improved photosynthetic rates were achieved under combined salt and drought stresses, as well as under combined heat and drought stresses. Furthermore, field-grown transgenic cotton plants performed better in rain-fed plots when compared to non-transgenic plants.