Open Access

ARTICLE

Cloning and Drought Resistance Analysis of Soybean GmHsps_p23-like Gene

Yuzhe Zhang^1,#, Guanglong Li^1,#, Shaowang Hu¹, Jinfeng Liu¹, Yushi Jiang¹, Siyan Liu^2,*, Shuyan Guan^2,*, Jing Qu², Dan Yao¹, Andi Shi¹, Yixuan Liu¹

1 College of Life Sciences, Jilin Agricultural University, Changchun, 130118, China
2 College of Agronomy, Jilin Agricultural University, Changchun, 130118, China

* Corresponding Authors: Siyan Liu. Email: ; Shuyan Guan. Email:
# Yuzhe Zhang, Guanglong Li contributed equally to this work

Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany 2022, 91(6), 1183-1198. https://doi.org/10.32604/phyton.2022.018853

Received 21 August 2021; Accepted 03 November 2021; Issue published 14 February 2022

Abstract

Soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) is an important cultivated crop, which requires much water during its growth, and drought seriously affects soybean yields. Studies have shown that the expression of small heat shock proteins can enhance drought resistance, cold resistance and salt resistance of plants. In this experiment, soybean GmHsps_p23-like gene was successfully cloned by RT-PCR, the protein encoded by the GmHsps_p23-like gene was subjected to bioinformatics analysis, and the pCAMBIA3301-GmHsps_p23-like overexpression vector and pCBSG015-GmHsps_p23-like gene editing vector were constructed. Agrobacterium-mediated method was used to transform soybeans to obtain positive plants. RT-PCR detection, rehydration experiment and drought resistance physiological and biochemical index detection were performed on the T₂ generation positive transgenic soybean plants identified by PCR and Southern hybridization. The results showed that the overexpression vector plant GmHsps_p23-like gene expression increased. After rehydration, the transgenic overexpression plants returned to normal growth, and the damage to the plants was low. After drought stress, the SOD and POD activities and the PRO content of the transgenic overexpression plants increased, while the MDA content decreased. The reverse was true for soybean plants with genetically modified editing vectors. The drought resistance of the overexpressed soybeans under drought stress was higher than that of the control group, and had a stronger drought resistance. It showed that the expression of soybean GmHsps_p23-like gene can improve the drought resistance of soybean. The cloning and functional verification of soybean GmHsps_p23-like gene had not been reported yet. This is the first time that PCR technology has been used to amplify the soybean GmHsps_p23-like gene and construct an expression vector for this gene. This research has laid the foundation for transgenic technology to improve plant drought resistance and cultivate new drought-resistant transgenic soybean varieties.

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