Oral Paper

         Physiology

Mulberry genes as a promising tool for enhancing crop resilience to environmental stresses

Presenting Author
Hari Meena
Description
Plants are constantly exposed to various environmental stresses that can adversely impact their survival and performance. To overcome these challenges, plants have evolved defense responses that involve the reprogramming of gene expression and the production of certain metabolites. One of the major aspects of crop improvement is the identification of putative abiotic stress tolerance genes. Mulberry, a hardy perennial crop, exhibits remarkable characteristics such as fast growth and stress adaptability, making it an interesting model system to study abiotic stress tolerance mechanisms. In this study, a drought-specific transcriptome that was previously generated was analyzed to determine whether genes involved in drought tolerance can impart oxidative stress tolerance. Five genes were selected for in-silico expression analysis using the Arabidopsis e-northern BAR database to reveal their putative role. Further, in-vivo expression analysis was conducted by exposing Mulberry plants to methyl viologen (10µM) to induce oxidative stress. The results of qRT-PCR-based expression analysis showed that the expression of MaDUF1068-like, MaCatalase, MaNCED, MaIsocitrate-dehydrogenase, and MaP5C genes was significantly higher in stressed plants than in control plants after 12 and 24 hours of treatment. These results indicate that these genes may play a crucial role in developing crop resilience for multiple abiotic stress tolerances. Top of Form