Albino Rice Reveals Key Gene for Chlorophyll Production and Chloroplast Development in Rice

Researchers from the Sanming Academy of Agricultural Sciences in China reported the gene in rice's formation of chlorophyll and chloroplast. Their findings are published in Plant Growth Regulation.

Chlorophyll production and chloroplast development are vital in studying leaf color, a highly important agronomic trait, especially in rice. The research team found mutant rice oryza sativa albino leaf 50 (osal50), which lacks the usual green pigments and exhibits white stripes on the leaves and with white panicles. Compared with regular rice, the osal50 mutant had less chlorophyll and other coloring agents and had an unusual chloroplast structure. These abnormalities were found to be rooted in a missing gene, OsAL50, which was confirmed by knocking out the gene in the rice genome using CRISPR-Cas9. Further analysis showed that OsAL50 is necessary for controlling photosynthetic pigment metabolism, photosynthesis, and chloroplast biogenesis.

Read the research article in the Plant Growth Regulation journal.