Project description:Transfer of genetic traits from wild or related species into cultivated rice is nowadays an important aim in rice breeding. Breeders use genetic crosses to introduce desirable genes from exotic germplasms into cultivated rice varieties. However, in many hybrids there is only a low level of pairing (if existing) and recombination at early meiosis between cultivated rice and wild relative chromosomes. With the objective of getting deeper into the knowledge of the proteins involved in early meiosis, when chromosomes associate correctly in pairs and recombine, the proteome of isolated rice meiocytes has been characterized by nLC-MS/MS at every stage of early meiosis (prophase I). Up to 1316 different proteins have been identified in rice isolated meiocytes in early meiosis, being 422 exclusively identified in early prophase I (leptotene, zygotene or pachytene). The classification of proteins in functional groups showed that 167 were related to chromatin structure and remodelling, nucleic acid binding, cell-cycle regulation and cytoskeleton. Moreover, the putative roles of sixteen proteins which have not been previously associated to meiosis or were not identified in rice before, are also discussed namely: seven proteins involved in chromosome structure and remodeling, five regulatory proteins (such as SKP1 (OSK), a putative CDK2 like efector), a protein with RNA recognition motifs, a neddylation-related protein, and two microtubule-related proteins. Revealing the proteins involved in early meiotic processes could provide a valuable tool kit to manipulate chromosome associations during meiosis in rice breeding programs.
Project description:MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play key roles in plant reproduction. However, knowledge on microRNAome analysis in autotetraploid rice is rather limited. Here, high-throughput sequencing technology was employed to analyze miRNAomes during pollen development in autotetraploid rice. A total of 172 differentially expressed miRNAs (DEM) were detected in autotetraploid rice compared to its diploid counterpart, and 57 miRNAs were specifically expressed in autotetraploid rice. Of the 172 DEM, 115 and 61 miRNAs were found to be up-regulated and down-regulated, respectively. Gene Ontology analysis on the targets of up-regulated DEM showed that they were enriched in transport and membrane in pre-meiotic interphase, reproduction in meiosis, and nucleotide binding in single microspore stage. osa-miR5788 and osa-miR1432-5p_R+1 were up-regulated in meiosis and their targets revealed interaction with the meiosis-related genes, suggesting that they may involve in the genes regulation associated with the chromosome behavior. Abundant 24-nt siRNAs associated with transposable elements were found in autotetraploid rice during pollen development; however, they significantly declined in diploid rice, suggesting that 24-nt siRNAs may play a role in pollen development. These findings provide a foundation for understanding the effect of polyploidy on small RNA expression patterns during pollen development that lead to low pollen fertility in autotetraploid rice.
Project description:Protein lysine acetylation (KAC) is a dynamic and reversible post-translational modification, playing important biological roles in many organisms.Here, we reported results from a proteomic investigation to detect KAC status of the developing rice anthers near the time of meiosis (RAM), providing strong biochemical evidence for roles of many KAC-affected proteins during rice anther development and meiosis. We identified a total of 1,354 KAC sites in 676 proteins.
Project description:The leptotene-zygotene transition is a major step in meiotic progression during which pairing between homologous chromosomes is initiated and double strand breaks occur. OsAM1, a homolog of maize AM1 and Arabidopsis SWI1, encodes a protein with a coiled-coil domain in its central region that is required for the leptotene-zygotene transition during rice meiosis. To gain more insight into the role of OsAM1 in rice meiosis and to identify additional meiosis-specific genes, we characterized the transcriptomes of young panicles of Osam1 mutant and wild-type rice plants using RNA-Seq, bioinformatic and statistical analyses. As a result, a total of 25,750 and 28,455 genes were expressed in young panicles of wild-type and Osam1 mutant plants, respectively, and 4,400 differentially expressed genes (DEGs; log2 Ratio ≥ 1, FDR ≤ 0.05) were identified. Of these DEGs, four known rice meiosis-specific genes were detected, and 22 new putative meiosis-related genes were found by mapping these DEGs to reference biological pathways in the KEGG database. We identified eight additional well-conserved OsAM1-responsive rice meiotic genes by comparing our RNA-Seq data with known meiotic genes in Arabidopsis and fission yeast.
Project description:Background: Partial pollen and embryo sac sterilities are the two main reasons for low fertility in autotetraploid rice. Our previous study revealed that small RNAs changes may associate with pollen fertility in autotetraploid rice. However, knowledge on comparative analysis between the development of pollen and embryo sac by small RNAs in autotetraploid rice is still unknown. In the present study, WE-CLSM (whole-mount eosin B-staining confocal laser scanning microscopy) and high-throughput sequencing technology was employed to examine the cytological variations and to analyze small RNAs changes during pollen and embryo sac development in autotetraploid rice compared with its diploid counterpart. Results: A total of 321 and 368 differentially expressed miRNAs (DEM) were detected during development of pollen and embryo sac in autotetraploid rice, respectively. Gene Ontology enrichment analysis on the targets of miRNAs-enriched during the development of pollen and embryo sac in autotetraploid rice revealed 30 prominent functional gene classes, such as cell differentiation and signal transduction during embryo sac development. However, only 7 prominent functional gene classes, such as flower development and transcription factor activity, were detected during pollen development. The expression levels of 39 DEM, which revealed interaction with meiosis-related genes, showed opposite expression levels in pollen and embryo sac development. Of these DEM, osa-miR1436_L+3_1ss5CT and osa-miR167h-3p were associated with the female meiosis, while osa-miR159a.1 and osa-MIR159a-p5 were related with the male meiosis. 21nt-phasiRNAs were detected both during pollen and embryo sac development, while 24nt-phasiRNAs were found only in pollen development, which displayed down-regulation in autotetraploid compared to diploid rice and their spatial-temporal expression patterns were similar to osa-miR2275d. 24nt TEs-siRNAs were found to be up-regulated in embryo sac but down-regulated in pollen development. Conclusion: The above results not only provide the small RNAs changes during four landmark stages of pollen and embryo sac development in autotetraploid rice but also have identified specifically expressed miRNAs, especially meiosis-related miRNAs, pollen-24nt-phasiRNAs and TEs-siRNAs in autotetraploid rice. Together, these findings provide a foundation for understanding the effect of polyploidy on small RNAs expression patterns during pollen and embryo sac development that may lead to different abnormalities in autotetraploid rice.
Project description:Background: The three-dimensional spatial organization of the genome plays important roles in chromatin accessibility and gene expression in multiple biological process, and has been reported to be altered in response to environmental stress. However, the functional changes in spatial genome organization during environmental changes in crop plants are poorly understood. Results: Here we perform Hi-C, ATAC-seq and RNA-seq in two agronomically important rice cultivars, Nipponbare (Nip; Japonica) and 93-11 (Indica), to report a comprehensive profile of nuclear dynamics during heat stress (HS). We show that heat stress affects different levels of chromosome organization, including A/B compartment transition, increase in size of topologically associated domains, and loss of short-range interactions. The chromatin architectural changes were associated with chromatin accessibility and gene expression changes. Comparative analysis revealed that 93-11 exhibited more dynamic gene expression and chromatin accessibility changes, including of HS-related genes, consistent with observed higher HS tolerance in this cultivar. Conclusions: Our data uncovered higher-order chromatin architecture as a new layer in understanding transcriptional regulation in response to heat stress in rice.
Project description:The leptotene-zygotene transition is a major step in meiotic progression during which pairing between homologous chromosomes is initiated and double strand breaks occur. OsAM1, a homolog of maize AM1 and Arabidopsis SWI1, encodes a protein with a coiled-coil domain in its central region that is required for the leptotene-zygotene transition during rice meiosis. To gain more insight into the role of OsAM1 in rice meiosis and to identify additional meiosis-specific genes, we characterized the transcriptomes of young panicles of Osam1 mutant and wild-type rice plants using RNA-Seq, bioinformatic and statistical analyses. As a result, a total of 25,750 and 28,455 genes were expressed in young panicles of wild-type and Osam1 mutant plants, respectively, and 4,400 differentially expressed genes (DEGs; log2 Ratio ≥ 1, FDR ≤ 0.05) were identified. Of these DEGs, four known rice meiosis-specific genes were detected, and 22 new putative meiosis-related genes were found by mapping these DEGs to reference biological pathways in the KEGG database. We identified eight additional well-conserved OsAM1-responsive rice meiotic genes by comparing our RNA-Seq data with known meiotic genes in Arabidopsis and fission yeast. We sequenced the transcriptome of young panicles of Osam1 mutant and wild-type rice.
Project description:Anther development, particularly around the time of meiosis, is extremely crucial for plant sexual reproduction. Meanwhile, cell-to-cell communication between somatic (especial tapetum) cells and meiocytes are important for both somatic anther development and meiosis. To investigate possible molecular mechanisms involved in protein activities during anther development, we applied high-resolution mass spectrometry-based proteomic and phosphoproteomic analyses for developing rice (Oryza sativa) anthers around the time of meiosis (RAM). In total, we identified 4,984 proteins and 3,203 phosphoproteins with 8,973 unique phosphorylation sites (p-sites). Among those detected here, 1,544 phosphoproteins are currently absent in the Plant Protein Phosphorylation DataBase (P3DB), substantially enriching plant phosphorylation information. Mapman enrichment analysis showed that “DNA repair”, “transcription regulation” and “signalling” related proteins were over-represented in the phosphorylated proteins. Ten genetically identified rice meiotic proteins were detected to be phosphorylated at a total of 25 p-sites; moreover more than 400 meiotically expressed proteins were revealed to be phosphorylated and their phosphorylation sites were precisely assigned. 163 putative secretory proteins, possibly functioning in cell-to-cell communication, are also phosphorylated. Furthermore, we showed that DNA synthesis, RNA splicing and RNA-directed DNA methylation pathways are extensively affected by phosphorylation. In addition, our data support forty-six kinase-substrate pairs predicted by the rice Kinase-Protein Interaction Map, with SnRK1 substrates highly enriched. Taken together, our data revealed extensive protein phosphorylation during anther development, suggesting an important post-translational modification mechanism for protein activity.
Project description:To comprehend the gene expression profile in rice panicle under high temperature, Agilent 4×44k rice oligo microarray experiments were carried out using rice panicle of post-meiosis at 0 min, 10min, 20 min, 60 min, and 2 hr after the treatment of 40 degree centigrade, and the differentially expressed genes at the time course were involved in binding, catalysis, stress response, and cellular process. The significantly expressed genes were mainly up-regulated. Among HR genes, the predominant transcription factor gene families were Hsf, NAC, AP2/ERF, WRKY, MYB, and C2H2. The MapMan analysis demonstrated that, under heat treatment, the HR genes were enriched in the pathways related to biotic stress, abiotic stress including heat and cold, and cell cycle and development, ubiquitin-proteasome , lipid and secondary metabolisms, which revealed the great importance of cross-talk and protein homeostasis in response to heat in rice panicle of post-meiosis.
Project description:Background: The three-dimensional spatial organization of the genome plays important roles in chromatin accessibility and gene expression in multiple biological process, and has been reported to be altered in response to environmental stress. However, the functional changes in spatial genome organization during environmental changes in crop plants are poorly understood. Results: Here we perform Hi-C, ATAC-seq and RNA-seq in two agronomically important rice cultivars, Nipponbare (Nip; Japonica) and 93-11 (Indica), to report a comprehensive profile of nuclear dynamics during heat stress (HS). We show that heat stress affects different levels of chromosome organization, including A/B compartment transition, increase in size of topologically associated domains, and loss of short-range interactions. The chromatin architectural changes were associated with chromatin accessibility and gene expression changes. Comparative analysis revealed that 93-11 exhibited more dynamic gene expression and chromatin accessibility changes, including of HS-related genes, consistent with observed higher HS tolerance in this cultivar. Conclusions: Our data uncovered higher-order chromatin architecture as a new layer in understanding transcriptional regulation in response to heat stress in rice.