Comprehensive transcriptome analysis and flavonoid profiling of Ginkgo leaves reveals flavonoid content alterations in day-night cycles

Jun Ni; Lixiang Dong; Zhifang Jiang; Xiuli Yang; Ziying Chen; Yuhuan Wu; Maojun Xu

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0193897

Comprehensive transcriptome analysis and flavonoid profiling of Ginkgo leaves reveals flavonoid content alterations in day-night cycles

PLoS One. 2018 Mar 1;13(3):e0193897. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0193897. eCollection 2018.

Authors

Jun Ni^{1

2}, Lixiang Dong^{1

2}, Zhifang Jiang^{1

2}, Xiuli Yang^{1

2}, Ziying Chen¹, Yuhuan Wu¹, Maojun Xu^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Hangzhou City for Quality and Safety of Agricultural Products, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China.
² Zhejiang Provincial Key Laboratory for Genetic Improvement and Quality Control of Medicinal Plants, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China.

Abstract

Ginkgo leaves are raw materials for flavonoid extraction. Thus, the timing of their harvest is important to optimize the extraction efficiency, which benefits the pharmaceutical industry. In this research, we compared the transcriptomes of Ginkgo leaves harvested at midday and midnight. The differentially expressed genes with the highest probabilities in each step of flavonoid biosynthesis were down-regulated at midnight. Furthermore, real-time PCR corroborated the transcriptome results, indicating the decrease in flavonoid biosynthesis at midnight. The flavonoid profiles of Ginkgo leaves harvested at midday and midnight were compared, and the total flavonoid content decreased at midnight. A detailed analysis of individual flavonoids showed that most of their contents were decreased by various degrees. Our results indicated that circadian rhythms affected the flavonoid contents in Ginkgo leaves, which provides valuable information for optimizing their harvesting times to benefit the pharmaceutical industry.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Circadian Rhythm / genetics*
Down-Regulation / genetics
Flavonoids / genetics*
Gene Expression Profiling / methods
Gene Expression Regulation, Plant / genetics
Ginkgo biloba / genetics*
Photoperiod
Plant Leaves / genetics*
Plant Proteins / genetics
Transcriptome / genetics*

Substances

Flavonoids
Plant Proteins

Grants and funding

This work was funded by Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. LY18C060008) (JN), Independent Projects for Agricultural Research (Grant No. 20170432B07) (JN), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 81673539 and 81373907) (MX). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.