Genome-wide identification and expression analysis of the HAK/KUP/KT gene family in Moso bamboo

Hui Guo; Jiaqi Tan; Yang Jiao; Bing Huang; Ruifang Ma; Muthusamy Ramakrishnan; Guoning Qi; Zhijun Zhang

doi:10.3389/fpls.2024.1331710

Genome-wide identification and expression analysis of the HAK/KUP/KT gene family in Moso bamboo

Front Plant Sci. 2024 Mar 26:15:1331710. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1331710. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Hui Guo^#¹, Jiaqi Tan^#¹, Yang Jiao¹, Bing Huang¹, Ruifang Ma¹, Muthusamy Ramakrishnan², Guoning Qi¹, Zhijun Zhang¹

Affiliations

¹ Bamboo Industry Institute, State Key Laboratory of Subtropical Silviculture, Zhejiang A&F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Tree Genetics and Breeding, Co-Innovation Center for Sustainable Forestry in Southern China, Bamboo Research Institute, Key Laboratory of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Subtropical Forest Biodiversity Conservation, College of Biology and the Environment, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

The K⁺ uptake permease/high-affinity K⁺/K⁺ transporter (KUP/HAK/KT) family is the most prominent group of potassium (K⁺) transporters, playing a key role in K⁺ uptake, transport, plant growth and development, and stress tolerance. However, the presence and functions of the KUP/HAK/KT family in Moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis (Carriere) J. Houzeau), the fastest-growing plant, have not been studied. In this study, we identified 41 KUP/HAK/KT genes (PeHAKs) distributed across 18 chromosomal scaffolds of the Moso bamboo genome. PeHAK is a typical membrane protein with a conserved structural domain and motifs. Phylogenetic tree analysis classified PeHAKs into four distinct clusters, while collinearity analysis revealed gene duplications resulting from purifying selection, including both tandem and segmental duplications. Enrichment analysis of promoter cis-acting elements suggested their plausible role in abiotic stress response and hormone induction. Transcriptomic data and STEM analyses indicated that PeHAKs were involved in tissue and organ development, rapid growth, and responded to different abiotic stress conditions. Subcellular localization analysis demonstrated that PeHAKs are predominantly expressed at the cell membrane. In-situ PCR experiments confirmed that PeHAK was mainly expressed in the lateral root primordia. Furthermore, the involvement of PeHAKs in potassium ion transport was confirmed by studying the potassium ion transport properties of a yeast mutant. Additionally, through homology modeling, we revealed the structural properties of HAK as a transmembrane protein associated with potassium ion transport. This research provides a solid basis for understanding the classification, characterization, and functional analysis of the PeHAK family in Moso bamboo.

Keywords: HAK; STEM; abiotic stress; bamboo; gene expression; potassium ion transport.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. The work was funded by Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. LTGN23C160002), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 31770721, 32171879, 32371975) and the State Key Laboratory of Subtropical Silviculture (grant no. SKLSS-KF2022-08).