Profiling gene expression during root induction in juvenile and mature cuttings of Eucalyptus grandis revealed developmental and auxin dependent regulation of the microtubule system
Rooting capability is one of the economically traits lost during the juvenile to mature phase change in woody plants. A comprehensive microarray analysis was performed to compare the profiles of gene expression in juvenile and mature cuttings from E. grandis, either auxin treated or untreated on days, 0, 1, 3, 6, 9 and 12 post excision. At the end of the experiment, root primordia were observed only in auxin treated juvenile cuttings. Clustering the expression profiles revealed that the time after excision contributed to expression differences more than the age or auxin. Maximum differences contributed by the age and auxin occurred on day 6 which correlated with the kinetics of root primordia formation. These included genes related to the microtubules (MTs) system. Therefore, expression of 42 transcripts annotated as tubulin or MTs associated proteins (MAPs) was validated in the same RNA samples. The results suggest developmental and auxin regulation of MTs. To determine the relevance to adventitious root (AR) formation, subtle perturbations to MTs were performed with trifluralin during induction. While juvenile cuttings were not affected, improved rooting was obtained in mature cuttings. Taken together it suggests that specific MTs remodeling is required for AR formation in E. grandis.
Overall design
mRNA samlpes from mature and juvenile Eucalyptus sections immediately after cutting served as contorls. The rest of the samples were mature and juvenile sections, treated of not treated with Auxin, 1, 3, 6, 9 and 12 days after the prunning. At each time point, a loop design was performed consisting of a juvenile untreated vs. mature untreated array, a matrue untreated vs. mature auxin treated array, a matrue auxin treated vs. juvenile auxin treated array, and a juvenile auxin treated vs. juvenile untreated array. additional arrays connected between these loops, and between them and the time 0 controls. Most conditions had 3 replicates, but mature-untreated-day1 had 4 replicates, and three conditions had 2 replicates each: Juvenile-auxin-treated-day1, juvenile-untreated-day6, and mature-auxin-treated-day9.
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