Plant cadmium resistance 10 enhances tolerance to toxic heavy metals in poplar

Jing Guan; Yahan Yang; Qinghua Shan; Haizhen Zhang; Aimin Zhou; Shufang Gong; Tuanyao Chai; Kun Qiao

doi:10.1016/j.plaphy.2023.108043

Plant cadmium resistance 10 enhances tolerance to toxic heavy metals in poplar

Plant Physiol Biochem. 2023 Oct:203:108043. doi: 10.1016/j.plaphy.2023.108043. Epub 2023 Sep 16.

Authors

Jing Guan¹, Yahan Yang¹, Qinghua Shan¹, Haizhen Zhang¹, Aimin Zhou¹, Shufang Gong¹, Tuanyao Chai², Kun Qiao³

Affiliations

¹ College of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin, 150030, PR China.
² College of Life Science, University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, PR China.
³ College of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin, 150030, PR China. Electronic address: kunqiao@neau.edu.cn.

PMID: 37734271
DOI: 10.1016/j.plaphy.2023.108043

Abstract

Toxic heavy metals originating from human activities have caused irreversible harm to the environment. Toxic heavy metal ions absorbed by crop plants can seriously threaten human health. Therefore, decreasing heavy metal contents in crop plants is an urgent need. The plant cadmium resistance protein (PCR) is a heavy metal ion transporter. In this study, PePCR10 was cloned from Populus euphratica. Bioinformatics analyses revealed its transmembrane structure and gene sequence motifs. The transcript profile of PePCR10 was analyzed by RT-qPCR, and its transcript levels increased under toxic heavy metal (cadmium, lead, aluminum) treatments. Subcellular localization analyses in tobacco cells revealed that PePCR10 localizes at the plasma membrane. Compared with wild type (WT), PePCR10-overexpressing lines showed significantly higher values for plant height, root length, fresh weight, and dry weight under heavy metal stress. Electrolyte leakage, nitroblue tetrazolium staining, and chlorophyll fluorescence analyses indicated that Cd/Al tolerance in PePCR10-overexpressing lines was stronger than that in WT. The Cd/Al contents were lower in the PePCR10-overexpressing lines than in WT under Cd/Al stress. Our results show that PePCR10 can reduce the heavy metal content in poplar and enhance its Cd/Al tolerance. Hence, PePCR10 is a candidate genetic resource for effectively reducing heavy metal accumulation in crops.

Keywords: Aluminum; Cadmium; PCR10; Populus euphratica; Tolerance; Translocation.