Biotech Updates

Alcohol dehydrogenase 1 Confers Abiotic and Biotic Stress Resistance in Arabidopsis

June 14, 2017

While the regulation and transcription factors of the Arabidosis gene AtADH1 in response to abiotic stress are known, its in vivo roles remain unknown. Haitao Shi of Hainan University, together with researchers from various Chinese Universities, studied the roles of AtADH1.

The team found that AtADH1 expression was largely induced by salt, drought, and cold stresses, as well as pathogen infection. Further analysis als showed that AtADH1 overexpression led to plants more sensitive to abscisic acid (ABA) compared to wide types (WT). Meanwhile, AtADH1-knockout mutants showed no significant difference compared with WT in ABA sensitivity.

AtADH1-overexpressing plants also showed improved stress resistance to salt, drought, cold and pathogen infection. Furthermore, overexpression of AtADH1 also increased the transcript levels of multiple stress-related genes.

These results indicate that AtADH1 confers enhanced resistance to both abiotic and biotic stresses.

For more on this study, read the article in Plant Science.