https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1892-4650
Figures
Abstract
Temperature is one of the most important environmental factors for plant growth, as low-temperature freezing damage seriously affects the yield and distribution of plants. The Lanzhou lily (Lilium davidii, var. unicolor) is a famous ornamental plant with high ornamental value. Using an Illumina HiSeq transcriptome sequencing platform, sequencing was conducted on Lanzhou lilies exposed to two different temperature conditions: a normal temperature treatment at 20°C (A) and a cold treatment at −4°C (C). After being treated for 24 hours, a total of 5848 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified, including 3478 significantly up regulated genes and 2370 significantly down regulated genes, accounting for 10.27% of the total number of DEGs. Quantitative real-time PCR (QRT-PCR) analysis showed that the expression trends of 10 randomly selected DEGs coincided with the results of high-throughput sequencing. In addition, genes responding to low-temperature stress were analyzed using the interaction regulatory network method. The anti-freeze pathway of Lanzhou lily was found to involve the photosynthetic and metabolic pathways, and the key freezing resistance genes were the OLEO3 gene, 9 CBF family genes, and C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP). This lays the foundation for revealing the underlying mechanism of the molecular anti-freeze mechanism in Lanzhou lily.
Citation: Tian X, Li J, Chen S (2024) Key anti-freeze genes and pathways of Lanzhou lily (Lilium davidii, var. unicolor) during the seedling stage. PLoS ONE 19(3): e0299259. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0299259
Editor: Haitao Shi, Hainan University, CHINA
Received: November 2, 2023; Accepted: February 7, 2024; Published: March 21, 2024
Copyright: © 2024 Tian et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Data Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.
Funding: Natural Science Foundation of Yangling Vocational and Technical College, BG2021009 Mrs Xuehui Tian.
Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Introduction
Low-temperature stress injury is a common and serious natural disaster in agricultural production that causes huge losses in the world every year, up to hundreds of millions of dollars [1–5]. However, the mo-lecular mechanism of cold resistance in lilies is still poorly understood.
Lily is a world-famous ornamental plant, as well as a homologous plant used as medicine and food. Lily bulbs are rich in nutrition and have multiple functions, such as clearing away lung heat and moisturiz-ing, relieving cough, clearing away heart fire, and enhancing immunity [2, 6, 7]. Studying the molecular mechanism of cold resistance in lily can not only promote the research and development of excellent- quality varieties but also have a wide range of applications to solve the practical problems encountered in lilies production.
Currently, studies on the cold resistance of lilies have mainly focused on Lily cultivation physiology, such as Asiatic lilies [2, 7], Oriental lilies [8, 9], and Lilium lancifolium [7, 10]. Research on lily cold resistance mainly focuses on cell membrane permeability and the protective enzyme system. The relative electrical conductivity, the lipid membrane oxidation product malondialdehyde, and the activity of antioxidant en-zymes (superoxide dismutase, catalase, and peroxide dismutase) are usually used as physiological indica-tors of plant cold tolerance [11–14]. Hoshi et al. [15] studied the transcriptome of lilies mediated by Agro-bacterium and established a transgenic production system for hybrid Oriental lily varieties. Du [16] se-quenced the transcriptional data of different lily organs and developed simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. Tang et al. [17] investigated the secondary metabolites of different lily bulb extracts and their an-tioxidant capacity. Shafiee-Masouleh et al. [6] studied the magnetic and chelating structure of nano-chitosan as a supplementing fertilizer for lilies. Zhao et al. [18] compared and analyzed the petal ep-idermal wax components and water loss resistance of five cut flower lily varieties. Chen et al. [19] estab-lished a gene transformation system for Lily. In Lanzhou lily current research mainly focuses on cultivation techniques and bulb nutrition. Teng et al. [20] examined the effects of different substrates on the growth of lily bulbs. Ling et al. [21] investigated the isolation, purification and identification of pathogens from Lanzhou lily. Rao et al. [22] studied the influence of different potassium ion concentrations on the accu-mulation of secondary metabolites in the bulbs of Lanzhou lily. Lu et al. [23] investigated the nutritional components of the bulbs of Lanzhou lily from different lily-producing areas. Chen et al. [24] explored the prevention and control of the rot of Lanzhou lily bulbs during storage. Li et al. [25] studied the effect of low-temperature storage on carbohydrate metabolism of Lanzhou lily. Sun et al. [26] researched the influ-ence of different temperatures on the germination and growth of Lanzhou lily. However, there have been no the frost resistance of Lanzhou lily at the seedling stage.
Our previous studies have shown that the Lanzhou lily (Lilium davidii, var. unicolor) has a strong tolerance to low temperatures, and its growth is unaffected. However, the effect of subzero temperatures on the growth of Lanzhou lily, especially the molecular mechanism, remains to be further studied [27]. In this study, advanced Illumina high-throughput sequencing platform transcriptome sequencing technology was used to sequence the transcriptome mRNA of the leaves of Lanzhou lily growing at normal and sub-zero ultra-low temperatures, and the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and pathways at normal and sub-zero low-temperatures were compared to investigate the gene expression of Lanzhou lily under ul-tra-low-temperature stress. Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) annotation and concentration analysis were conducted for DEGs to further select genes related to freezing resistance in Lanzhou lily.
Materials and methods
Experimental materials and growth conditions
Forty 3-year-old Lanzhou lily bulbs were purchased from a local flower market in Qilihe District (103°54’E, 35°56’N, altitude 2638 m), Lanzhou city, Gansu Province, China, and stored for 110 days in a refrigerator at 2°C. After vernalization, the bulbs were planted in 15-cm-diameter flower pots filled with 2 L of commercial cultivation substrate composed of ½ peat + ½ garden soil (Mengda, Yufeng Co., Ltd., Xianyang, China) and placed in an intelligent artificial climate box (RXZ-0288, Ningbo Jiangnan Instru-ment Factory, Ningbo, China) at the Northwest Agriculture and Forestry University, Yangling, Shaanxi, China. The growth environment temperature was set to 20°C during the day and 15°C at night, the rela-tive air humidity was 50%–65%, the light-dark cycle was 16 light– 8 h dark, and the mean light illumi-nance was (350 ± 20) μmol /(m2 • s). Every 3–5 days, 300 mL of water was poured onto the culture medi-um, and Hoagland nutrient solution was used to provide adequate nutrients. The nutrient solution formula was as follows: 945mg/L calcium nitrate, 607mg/L phosphate nitrate, 115mg/L ammonium phosphate, 493mg/L magnesium sulfate, 2.5ml/L iron salt solution, and 5ml/L trace elements at pH = 6.0.
Chemicals and treatments
Lily seedlings that had grown to approximately 15 cm in height were placed in an intelligent low-temperature artificial climate chamber for low-temperature treatment at −4°C [26], and the treatments lasted for 24 h [11, 28, 29]. The room temperature was 20°C in the control, and each treatment was repeated three times. Leaves from the same leaf position (the seventh to 10th leaves counted from the top) were sam-pled, immediately frozen in liquid nitrogen, and stored at −80°C until further processing.
Chemicals and treatments
Lily seedlings that had grown to approximately 15 cm in height were placed in an intelligent low-temperature artificial climate chamber for low-temperature treatment at −4°C [26], and the treatments lasted for 24 h [11, 28, 29]. The room temperature was 20°C in the control, and each treatment was repeated three times. Leaves from the same leaf position (the seventh to 10th leaves counted from the top) were sampled, immediately frozen in liquid nitrogen, and stored at −80°C until further processing.
Transcription sequencing
The total RNA of three samples of Lanzhou lily leaves was extracted using the TRIzol method [16], and the concentration, purity, and integrity of the RNA were detected. After the samples were qualified, magnetic beads with Oligo (dT) were used to enrich the eukaryotic mRNA [16]. The mRNA was then fragmented into short fragments by adding a fragmentation buffer. These mRNA fragments were then used as templates to synthesize both one strand of cDNA two strands of cDNA. Subsequently, AMPure XP beads were used to purify the synthetic two-stranded cDNA, followed successively by end repair, the addition of polyA tails, the connection of sequencing joints, and selection of fragment size.
The Illumina 4000 high-throughput sequencing platform (HiSeq/MiSeq) was used for sequencing after passing the quality inspection [30–33]. The data sequenced data were termed raw reads or raw data. Then, the transcription results were assembled and spliced, and the gene function annotation and expression levels were analyzed. Finally, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification was performed, and the PCR products were purified to obtain the final library. The clean data were deposited in the Short Read Archive database of the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) under Accession No. PRJNA565864.
Real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR (QRT-PCR) validation
Ten differentially expressed genes were randomly selected for QRT-PCR analysis to confirm the reliability of RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq). The leaf RNA of Lanzhou lily was used as material at 20°C and −4°C, and cDNA was synthesized via reverse transcription using the Hi Script II QRT Super Mix for the PCR kit (Nanjing Nuoweizan Biotechnology Co., Ltd., Nanjing, China) (Table 1). The Actin gene was used as the internal reference [34]. Each treatment was repeated three times to calculate the relative expression of the gene.
Statistical analysis
QRT-PCR assays were analyzed using a t-test at p < 0.01 and < 0.05. The primers for these genes were designed with PRIMER5.0 and are listed in Table 1. The transcriptome data were analyzed by Allwegene Technology Co., Ltd. (Beijing, China).
The DEGs that respond to cold stress were subjected to co-expression network analysis using the weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) function in the R package [35–37]. A soft threshold was selected based on scale independence higher than 0.8. Hierarchical clustering trees were built for DEGs within the network using a dissimilarity matrix among genes, which were then assigned into different modules by dynamic shearing, with the default parameter setting of Min Module Size = 30 and Cut Height = 0.25. For each module (namely a group of highly correlated genes), a filtered co-expression network was drawn to highlight hub gene(s) using the Cytoscape 3.8.0 software [38–40].
Results
Sequencing results spliced with Trinity
A total of 38.57 million and 38.66 million raw reads were obtained from the transcriptome libraries of lily leaves under the A(20°C) and C(−4°C) treatments, respectively (S1 Table), with a Q20 value of 94.56%, a Q30 value of 87.32%, and a sequence base GC content of 44.84%. The results indicate that the transcriptome sequencing of Lanzhou lily was of high quality and could provide a good basis for subsequent data assembly and analysis. The results of redundant sequence removal using Trinity transcript splicing and the clustering of similar sequences (CD-HIT) are shown in Table 2. The maximum unigene sequence length was <300 (Fig 1), indicating that transcription splicing was of high quality and conducive to subsequent analysis and research.
Note: The abscissa in the figure is the length interval of the spliced transcriptor unigene, and the ordinate is the frequency of occurrence of spliced transcripts or unigene of each length.
Gene function annotation results
Database comparison of the obtained transcriptome sequences showed that the number of annotated unigenes was 238,301, and the number of unigenes annotated by the NCBI protein non-redundant database (Nr) was 65,314, accounting for 27.41% of the total number of unigenes. The number of unigenes annotated by the eukaryotic orthologous gene database (KOG) was 42,138, accounting for 17.68% of the total number of unigenes, and the number of unigenes annotated by the GO library was 35,244, accounting for 14.79% of the total number of unigenes. The number of unigenes in the Swiss-Prot annotation was 46,337, accounting for 19.44% of the total number of unigenes, while the number of unigenes in the Pfam annotation was 58,605, accounting for 24.59% of the total number of unigenes (Table 3).
DEGs, KEGG analysis, and QRT-PCR verification
In this study, 5848 DEGs were identified in the Lanzhou lily transcriptome under subzero treatment (−4°C), among which 3478 DEGs were up regulated and 2370 DEGs were down regulated (Fig 2; S2 and S3 Tables). Using KEGG analysis, significant changes were found in genes related to protein kinase, protein phosphatase, carbon metabolism. Indole-3-glycerophosphate synthase, protein phosphatase, hexokinase, calc-binding protein, chlorophyll a/B-binding protein, and other related genes were significantly up regulated or down regulated.
Note: Significantly differentially expressed up regulated and down regulated genes are indicated by red and green dots, respectively. Genes that are not significantly differentially expressed are indicated by blue dots. The abscissa represents the gene expression fold change in different samples. The ordinate represents the statistical significance of the difference in gene expression.
KEGG enrichment analysis of DEGs
Pathways in which DEGs were significantly enriched relative to all annotated genes were identified. After pathway enrichment analysis, significant up regulated gene differences were found in significant abdominal muscle pathways, plant–pathogen interaction, amino acid and nucleotide sugar metabolism, plant circadian rhythm, and linoleic acid metabolism (Fig 3, S1 File). These up-regulated differential genes include c156798_g2, c163371_g2 (calcium-dependent protein kinase, EC:2.7.11.1), c166423_g2, c145559_g1 (respiratory burst oxidase, EC:1.6.3.- 1.11.1), c162064_g1, c164545_g2, c166855_g1(3.1027), c145934_g1(8.2812), c101051_g1(4.9356), c144017_g1(Inf), c144017_g2(Inf), c159000_g1(2.9702), c140553_g1(9.9651), c170503_g1(Inf), c140013_g1(3.7728), c154815_g1(Inf), c173122_g1(7.8456), c168962_g1(Inf), c163915_g1(Inf), c156536_g2(2.9685), c156536_g1(1.2021) (calmodulin), and c147877_g2 (mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase 4/5, EC:2.7.12.2). These genes mainly regulate plant-athogen interaction, and the genes related to pathogen interaction are closely related to plant resistance. The significantly enriched pathways of down regulated DEGs included photosynthesis, photosynthesis-antenna proteins, porphyrins and chlorophyll metabolism, carbon fixation in photosynthetic organisms, and fatty acid production (Fig 4, S2 File).
Note: The size of the center point indicates the number of enriched genes; the larger the point, the more enriched genes. The color indicates the credibility of the enrichment, and the larger the q value, the more obvious the enrichment effect.
Note: The size of the center point indicates the number of enriched genes; the larger the point, the more enriched genes. The color indicates the credibility of the enrichment, and the larger the q value, the more obvious the enrichment effect.
QRT-PCR verification
To verify the reliability of the RNA-seq results, 10 DEGs were randomly selected. These included five up regulated DEGs (c166605_g1, c199368_g1, c171769_g1, c164813_g2, and c153721_g1) and five down regulated DEGs (c76799_g1, c153860_g1, c149445_g1, c115377_g1, and c155535_g1), and Actin was used as the internal parameter for QRT-PCR verification. As shown in Fig 5, the expression degree of 10 genes under low-temperature stress differed, but the expression trend was consistent with the high-throughput sequencing results, indicating that the sequencing results were accurate and reliable (Fig 5).
Note: The relative expression levels of the selected genes were normalized to the expression level of the actin gene. The blue and red bars represent the relative expression levels of DEGs in Lanzhou lily exposed to different treatments calculated using the RNA-seq and QRT-PCR methods, respectively. The normal treatment temperature was 20°C; the subzero treatment temperature was −4°C.
Expression levels of genes in response to low-temperature stress
To identify key genes in the process of resistance to low-temperature stress in Lanzhou lily, genes participating in cold response (GO:0009409), cold response (GO:0050826; genes for GO:0009266), cold acclimation (GO:0009631), and cell response to cold (GO:0070417) were screened (Table 4). Analyzing the transcriptional changes of c148099_g1, c42561_g1, c117817_g1, and c160675_g2 under low-temperature stress revealed that the genes c148099_g1, c42561_g1, c117817_g1, and c160675_g2 showed significant differences (Fig 6A). The transcription levels of c148099_g1 and c42561_g1 decreased by 72% and 42%, respectively, under low-temperature stress. The genes c117817_g1 and c160675_g2 were activated under low-temperature stress, and their expression levels were significantly up regulated 6010.58 and 12294.41 times, respectively (Table 3). Further annotation in the NR database showed that the genes c148099_g1, c42561_g1, c117817_g1, and c160675_g2 (OLEO3) were stress-induced hydrophobic peptide, F-box protein 7, C2H2-type zinc finger protein, and Oleosin 18.2 kDa-like, respectively (Table 4). Therefore, it is speculate that these four genes can be regarded as the key genes in plant resistance to low-temperature stress. The c117817_g1 gene is a transcription factor that has the potential function of regulating downstream resistance reactions; therefore, its function in resisting low-temperature stress in Lanzhou lily is of great research value.
Note: Scatter plot of differentially expressed genes (C vs. A). Red points represent up regulated genes with log2 (fold change) > 1 and adjusted p (q-value) < 0.05 (−log10 (q-value) ≥ 1.3). Green points represent down regulated genes with log2 (fold change) < −1 and q-value < 0.05 (−log10 (q-value) ≥ 1.3). Black points represent genes with no significant differences. Fold change = gene normalized expression of the control group/gene normalized expression of the treatment group. B: Heat map of genes with known functions related to the cold stress response. The up and down regulated genes are shown in red and green, respectively. The FPKM (Z-Score) from transcriptome data represents the gene expression level. FPKM, fragments per kilobase of exon per million reads mapped.
In addition, among genes that respond to low-temperature stress, such as CBF, COR, ICR, and TOR (Fig 6B; Table 5), the CBF family genes were significantly affected in the process of resistance to low-temperature stress in lily. A total of 10 CBF family genes showed differential expression when exposed to low-temperature stress. Except for the c166871_g1 gene, the other nine genes were significantly activated, and their expression levels increased when Lanzhou lily was exposed to low-temperature stress. Therefore, based on the above results, it is speculated that the CBF family genes and C2H2 type transcription factor c117817_g1 play an important regulatory role in the response of Lanzhou lilies to low-temperature stress and that they are widely involved in the response pathway of Lanzhou lilies to low-temperature stress.
p < 0.05 is considered statistically significant.
Analysis of the interaction regulatory network of genes responding to low-temperature stress
To reveal the role of these key genes in the plant response to low-temperature stress, the regulatory interaction network of these genes was further analyzed. Genes in the CBF family play an indispensable role in their related interaction networks. Many genes regulated by CBF have functions related to plant stress resistance, such as MYB family transcription factors [41] (Table 6). As shown in Fig 7A, CBF genes exhibited potential interaction functions with many MYB transcription factors and could regulate each other. Therefore, it is suggested that changes in the CBF gene expression level can further affect the expression level of MYB transcription factors and thus play a role in the process of resistance to low-temperature stress in Lanzhou lily.
Note: Each circle represents an individual gene, and the dotted lines between the two genes indicate an interaction between them. The color represents the weight of the corresponding gene in this interaction network, and the red represents the core gene of this interaction network.
The GO functional enrichment analysis of genes in the regulatory interaction network involved in CBF revealed that stress-related functions, including “regulation of secondary cell wall biogenesis”, “regulation of cell processes”, “stimulus response”, “cell wall organization or biogenesis”, “lignin metabolic processes”, “hormone response”, and “photostimulation response”, were significantly enriched. Among them, “cell wall synthesis”, “stress response”, “lignin metabolism”, and “hormone function” played an important role in the plant’s response to low temperatures. It is speculated that these functions protect tissues from low-temperature damage during the response of Lanzhou lily to low temperatures.
The results of the regulatory interaction network of the c160675_g2 (OLEO3) gene [42] showed (Fig 7B) that the functions of genes with potential interaction with this gene were mainly related to “calcium ion binding”, “electron transport chain”, “respiratory electron transport chain”, “lipid metabolism process”, “ATP metabolism process”, “stress response”, and other calcium ions and genes related to energy metabolism (Table 7). In addition, similar to the CBF gene family, genes related to membrane structure and hormones, including “cytoplasmic part”, “membrane”, and “linoleic acid cyclooxygenase activity” were affected by the OLEO3 gene [43] (Table 7). Therefore, it is speculated that the OLEO3 gene functions by regulating calcium signaling and energy metabolism in plants and helps plants resist low-temperature stress. In addition, the OLEO3 gene can assist the CBF gene [44] to help plants reintegrate cell membrane structures when stressed by low temperatures and further activate downstream reactions by regulating hormone synthesis to enhance plant resistance to low temperatures. However, in the interaction network analysis of the c148099_g1 gene (Fig 7C), no interaction was found between genes with stress resistance functions and the c148099_g1 gene.
According to the above results, we believe that in the face of low-temperature stress, edible lily can stimulate c160675_g2 (OLEO3) and CBF family [45] genes, thereby regulating the changes in the cell membrane, energy metabolism, and the synthesis of hormones, lignin, and other secondary metabolites, thereby affecting the signaling pathway of hormones and calcium regulation. Thus, the c160675_g2 (OLEO3) gene effectively activates the downstream transcription factor to protect plants from hypothermia damage.
Interaction regulatory network and gene function analysis of C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP)
To study the function of C2H2 transcription factor [46] c117817_g1 (ZFP) under low-temperature stress in lily, this work analyzed the interaction regulatory network between the genes related to low-temperature stress in edible lily and the c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene (Fig 8). As shown in Fig 8, the c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene and genes related to the response to low-temperature stress in these plants had a close regulatory interaction. Moreover, the c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene held a core position in this interaction network, and many genes were regulated by the C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP). Thus, the c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene plays an indispensable role in this plant interaction regulatory network [47].
Note: Each circle represents an individual gene, and the dotted lines between two genes indicate an interaction between them. The color represents the weight of the corresponding gene in this interaction network, and red represents the core gene of this interaction network.
Further GO functional analysis of the genes involved in this interaction regulatory network revealed that these genes play a role in the photosystem, membrane, calcium ion binding, stress response, hormonal response, cold stress, abiotic stress response, and ABA response (Table 8). Among them, such genes are directly involved in the response to cold stress in Lanzhou lilies. Moreover, genes related to the cell membrane and calcium ion binding appeared in this interaction regulatory network, which was affected by the differential expression of the c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene.
Further analysis revealed that water channel activity and genes involved in the ABA reaction were also affected. These results indicate that plants can regulate ABA-related signaling pathways and change the activity of water channels in response to low-temperature stress. Therefore, ABA and water channel changes play an important role in the plant’s response to low-temperature stress. These genes are mainly involved in metabolic pathways such as photosynthesis (Fig 4), plant circadian rhythm, and linoleic acid metabolism (Fig 3). Therefore, it is speculated that C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP) can enhance the response and resistance of Lanzhou lily to low-temperature stress by regulating the metabolic processes of photosynthesis, circadian rhythm, and linoleic acid metabolism.
Discussion
Adverse growth environments, especially the stress of temperatures below zero, are a natural disaster that plants often encounter during their growth and development. In this study, an advanced sequencing platform, the Illumina 4000 high-throughput sequencing platform, was used to sequence Lanzhou lily treated at normal (20°C) and low temperatures (−4°C).
According to the results of the KEGG enrichment analysis, 25 DEGs participated in pathogen interaction pathways, 10 participated in amino acid and nucleotide sugar metabolism pathways, eight participated in plant circadian rhythm pathways, 15 participated in porphyrin regulation of chlorophyll metabolism pathways, and 16 participated in photosynthesis pathways. A total of 10 DEGs regulated the photosynthesis-antenna protein pathway, 13 regulated the carbon fixation pathway in photosynthetic organisms, and nine regulated the fatty acid elongation pathway.
Further analysis showed that the OLEO3 gene, nine CBF family genes, and the C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP) played an indispensable role in the response of edible lilies to low-temperature stress. These genes are mainly involved in the regulation of plant photosynthesis, calcium ion binding, membrane structure formation, and the ABA-dominated signaling pathway, having a function in the process of Lanzhou lily’s resistance to low-temperature stress.
Under low-temperature stress, CBF family genes showed significant activation, and their transcription levels were greatly improved. According to interaction network analysis, these genes interacted with MYB family genes, regulated the plant secondary cell wall and lignin synthesis, and affected hormone-related responses to enhance plant resistance to stress, such as ultra-low temperatures, and reduce plant tissue damage. Studies have shown that the CBF gene can interact with ATMYB14 in Arabidopsis, thus participating in freezing resistance and playing an important role in the plant response to cold stress [48–50]. In addition, the regulation effect of the typical R2R3-MYB transcription factor MYB88 on plant cold tolerance dependent on the CBF gene has been confirmed in apples [51], and the activation of this gene can promote the accumulation of plant anthocyanins and enhance resistance to low-temperature and oxidative stress [52]. This study also found that highly expressed CBF family genes interacted with multiple MYB transcription factors in Lanzhou lily, thereby affecting their expression and downstream resistance. This is similar to the findings reported above.
The C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP) gene also played an important role in the regulation of low-temperature stress in Lanzhou lily. According to the results of this study, this gene mainly interacts with genes involved in processes including photosynthesis, calcium ion binding, membrane structure formation, and ABA-dominated signaling pathways, and other processes in plants. Low-temperature stress research has shown that photosynthesis, ion balance, regulated dehydration, and other stress and hormone regulation pathways in plants are affected when they are subjected to low-temperature stress, enabling plants to resist low-temperature stress [53]. In addition, under low-temperature stress, the imbalance of the light absorption capacity and light dissipation capacity of plants leads to the destruction of Photosystem II (PS II) and the inhibition of photosynthesis [54]. In low-temperature-tolerant crops, such as cucumber [55], tobacco [56], and rice [57], light intensity and ambient temperature can affect chloroplasts and initiate signal transduction at low temperatures, thus coordinating gene expression between protoplasts and nuclei to adapt to changes in ambient temperatures [58]. This result is consistent with the photosynthesis inhibition found in the transcriptome of Lanzhou lily under low-temperature stress in this experiment, indicating that Lanzhou lily can also enhance its resistance to low-temperature stress by inhibiting photosynthesis. Lanzhou lily also resist low-temperature stress by adjusting the ABA signaling pathway to adapt to low-temperature changes. In this regard, it has been shown that cells can jointly maintain the balance of the cell state (i.e., the inflow and outflow are equal) through ABA and osmoregulatory substances (such as soluble sugars and proline) to enable plants to resist a certain degree of low-temperature damage [59]. Moreover, an increase in ABA content at low temperatures can promote the transcriptional level of CBF genes [45]. Although it has been demonstrated that such transcription factors can respond to low-temperature stress in plants [60], research in this area is still insufficient, and further study is needed.
According to the results of this study, The c160675_g2 (OLEO3) gene is mainly regulated by calcium ion binding, electron transport chain, respiratory electron transport chains, lipid metabolic processes, ATP metabolic process, response to stress and energy metabolic processes; all of these regulate the cold resistance of Lanzhou lily. Therefore, the OLEO3 gene can help Lanzhou lily withstand low-temperature stress by regulating plant calcium signaling and energy metabolism. In addition, under ultra-low temperature stress, the OLEO3 gene can interact with CBF gene to further activate downstream reactions and enhance plant resistance to low temperature by integrating cell membrane structure and regulating hormone synthesis. In previous reports, Marta Gliwicka et al. studied the expression of the Arabidopsis seed storage gene OLEO3 in somatic embryogenic culture, and no correlation was reported between OLEO3 and plant cold resistance [61]. The role of the c160675_g2 (OLEO3) gene in improving the cold resistance of lily can be focused on in subsequent studies.
The above genes related to low-temperature stress in Lanzhou lily are considered targets that can improve plant resistance to low temperatures. The function of these genes in Lanzhou lily under low-temperature stress and the reasons for their differential expression need to be further studied at the molecular level to explore the functions and effects of these genes under low-temperature stress and to provide theoretical support and direction for cultivating low-temperature-resistant Lily.
Conclusions
In total, 8558 DEGs were obtained by KEGG pathway analysis following transcriptome sequencing of the Lanzhou lily. After enrichment analysis, genes related to protein kinase, protein phosphatase, carbon metabolism, and ABA were identified as the main research objects for studying the cold response mechanism in Lanzhou lily. QRT-PCR analysis showed that the expression trends of 10 randomly selected DEGs were consistent with the high-throughput sequencing results. In addition, the interaction regulatory network, GO enrichment analysis, and gene function analysis showed that the pathways closely related to cold resistance in Lanzhou lily included photosynthetic and metabolic pathways. Key genes related to cold resistance were screened and predicted, namely gene OLEO3, nine CBF family genes, and C2H2 transcription factor c117817_g1 (ZFP), which occupied a key position in the gene interaction network and interacted with multiple genes to regulate freezing resistance in Lanzhou lily. These findings lay a foundation for revealing the molecular mechanism of freezing resistance in Lanzhou lily. In the follow-up study, we will use gene silencing test to verify whether OLEO3 gene is the key gene for cold resistance of Lanzhou lily.
Supporting information
S1 Table. Quality evaluation of RNA-seq data.
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S2 Table. Significantly enriched up-regulated DEGs of CvsA.
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S3 Table. Significantly enriched down-regulated DEGs of CvsA.
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S1 File. Up-regulated differential genes and enrichment pathways.
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S2 File. Down-regulated differential genes and enrichment pathways.
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Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the Beijing Allwegene Technology Co., Ltd., Beijing, China, for their services with regard to high throughput sequencing and transcriptome data analysis. We thank LetPub (www.letpub.com) for its linguistic assistance during the preparation of this manuscript.
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