Genome-editing of a circadian clock gene TaPRR95 facilitates wheat peduncle growth and heading date

Mingxue Fu; Shaoshuai Liu; Yuqing Che; Dada Cui; Zhongyin Deng; Yang Li; Xinyu Zou; Xingchen Kong; Guoliang Chen; Min Zhang; Yifan Liu; Xiang Wang; Wei Liu; Danmei Liu; Shuaifeng Geng; Aili Li; Long Mao

doi:10.1016/j.jgg.2024.05.011

Genome-editing of a circadian clock gene TaPRR95 facilitates wheat peduncle growth and heading date

J Genet Genomics. 2024 Oct;51(10):1101-1110. doi: 10.1016/j.jgg.2024.05.011. Epub 2024 Jun 6.

Authors

Mingxue Fu¹, Shaoshuai Liu¹, Yuqing Che¹, Dada Cui¹, Zhongyin Deng¹, Yang Li¹, Xinyu Zou¹, Xingchen Kong², Guoliang Chen³, Min Zhang³, Yifan Liu⁴, Xiang Wang⁴, Wei Liu⁵, Danmei Liu⁵, Shuaifeng Geng⁶, Aili Li⁷, Long Mao⁸

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Crop Gene Resources and Breeding and National Key Facility for Crop Resources and Genetic Improvement, Institute of Crop Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China.
² College of Life Sciences, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, Henan 453007, China.
³ College of Agronomy, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610106, China.
⁴ College of Agronomy, Henan Agricultural University, Zhengzhou, Henan 450002, China.
⁵ School of Life Science, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China.
⁶ State Key Laboratory of Crop Gene Resources and Breeding and National Key Facility for Crop Resources and Genetic Improvement, Institute of Crop Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China. Electronic address: [email protected].
⁷ State Key Laboratory of Crop Gene Resources and Breeding and National Key Facility for Crop Resources and Genetic Improvement, Institute of Crop Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China. Electronic address: [email protected].
⁸ State Key Laboratory of Crop Gene Resources and Breeding and National Key Facility for Crop Resources and Genetic Improvement, Institute of Crop Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China. Electronic address: [email protected].

PMID: 38849110
DOI: 10.1016/j.jgg.2024.05.011

Abstract

Plant height and heading date are important agronomic traits in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) that affect final grain yield. In wheat, knowledge of pseudo-response regulator (PRR) genes on agronomic traits is limited. Here, we identify a wheat TaPRR95 gene by genome-wide association studies to be associated with plant height. Triple allele mutant plants produced by CRISPR/Cas9 show increased plant height, particularly the peduncle, with an earlier heading date. The longer peduncle is mainly caused by the increased cell elongation at its upper section, whilst the early heading date is accompanied by elevated expression of flowering genes, such as TaFT and TaCO1. A peduncle-specific transcriptome analysis reveals up-regulated photosynthesis genes and down-regulated IAA/Aux genes for auxin signaling in prr95^aabbdd plants that may act as a regulatory mechanism to promote robust plant growth. A haplotype analysis identifies a TaPRR95-B haplotype (Hap2) to be closely associated with reduced plant height and increased thousand-grain weight. Moreover, the Hap2 frequency is higher in cultivars than that in landraces, suggesting the artificial selection on the allele during wheat breeding. These findings suggest that TaPRR95 is a regulator for plant height and heading date, thereby providing an important target for wheat yield improvement.

Keywords: CRISPR/Cas9; Heading date; Photosynthesis; Phytohormone; Plant height; Pseudo-response regulator (PRR); TaPRR95; Wheat.

MeSH terms

Alleles
CRISPR-Cas Systems / genetics
Circadian Clocks* / genetics
Gene Editing*
Gene Expression Regulation, Plant* / genetics
Genome-Wide Association Study
Haplotypes / genetics
Phenotype
Plant Proteins* / genetics
Plant Proteins* / metabolism
Triticum* / genetics
Triticum* / growth & development

Substances

Plant Proteins