Physiological and Differential Proteomic Analysis at Seedling Stage by Induction of Heavy-Ion Beam Radiation in Wheat Seeds

Yuqi Li; Jiayu Gu; Ahsan Irshad; Linshu Zhao; Huijun Guo; Hongchun Xiong; Yongdun Xie; Shirong Zhao; Yuping Ding; Libin Zhou; Fuquan Kong; Zhengwu Fang; Luxiang Liu

doi:10.3389/fgene.2022.942806

Physiological and Differential Proteomic Analysis at Seedling Stage by Induction of Heavy-Ion Beam Radiation in Wheat Seeds

Front Genet. 2022 Jul 19:13:942806. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2022.942806. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Yuqi Li^{1

2}, Jiayu Gu², Ahsan Irshad², Linshu Zhao², Huijun Guo², Hongchun Xiong², Yongdun Xie², Shirong Zhao², Yuping Ding², Libin Zhou³, Fuquan Kong⁴, Zhengwu Fang¹, Luxiang Liu²

Affiliations

¹ College of Agriculture, Yangtze University, Jingzhou, China.
² National Key Facility for Crop Gene Resources and Genetic Improvement, National Center of Space Mutagenesis for Crop Improvement, Institute of Crop Sciences, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China.
³ Biophysics Group, Institute of Modern Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, China.
⁴ China Institute of Atomic Energy, Beijing, China.

Abstract

Novel genetic variations can be obtained by inducing mutations in the plant which help to achieve novel traits. The useful mutant can be obtained through radiation mutation in a short period which can be used as a new material to produce new varieties with high yield and good quality wheat. In this paper, the proteomic analysis of wheat treated with different doses of ¹²C and ⁷Li ion beam radiation at the seedling stage was carried out through a Tandem Mass Tag (TMT) tagging quantitative proteomic analysis platform based on high-resolution liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry, and the traditional ⁶⁰Co-γ-ray radiation treatment for reference. A total of 4,764 up-regulated and 5,542 down-regulated differentially expressed proteins were identified. These proteins were mainly enriched in the KEGG pathway associated with amino acid metabolism, fatty acid metabolism, carbon metabolism, photosynthesis, signal transduction, protein synthesis, and DNA replication. Functional analysis of the differentially expressed proteins showed that the oxidative defense system in the plant defense system was fully involved in the defense response after ¹²C ion beam and ⁷Li ion beam radiation treatments. Photosynthesis and photorespiration were inhibited after ¹²C ion beam and ⁶⁰Co-γ-ray irradiation treatments, while there was no effect on the plant with ⁷Li ion beam treatment. In addition, the synthesis of biomolecules such as proteins, as well as multiple signal transduction pathways also respond to radiations. Some selected differentially expressed proteins were verified by Parallel Reaction Monitoring (PRM) and qPCR, and the experimental results were consistent with the quantitative results of TMT. The present study shows that the physiological effect of ¹²C ion beam radiation treatment is different as compared to the ⁷Li ion beam, but its similar to the ⁶⁰Co-γ ray depicting a significant effect on the plant by using the same dose. The results of this study will provide a theoretical basis for the application of ¹²C and ⁷Li ion beam radiation in the mutation breeding of wheat and other major crops and promote the development of heavy ion beam radiation mutation breeding technology.

Keywords: 12C ion beam; 7Li ion beam; TMT; proteomics; wheat.