Dataset Information

Coverage and composition of cuticular waxes on the fronds of the temperate ferns Pteridium aquilinum, Cryptogramma crispa, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, Polystichum munitum and Gymnocarpium dryopteris.

ABSTRACT:

Background and aims

The cuticular waxes sealing plant surfaces against excessive water loss are complex mixtures of very-long-chain aliphatics, with compositions that vary widely between plant species. To help fill the gap in our knowledge about waxes of non-flowering plant taxa, and thus about the cuticle of ancestral land plants, this study provides comprehensive analyses of waxes on temperate fern species from five different families.

Methods

The wax mixtures on fronds of Pteridium aquilinum, Cryptogramma crispa, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, Polystichum munitum and Gymnocarpium dryopteris were analysed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry for identification, and gas chromatography-flame ionization detection for quantification.

Key results

The wax mixtures from all five fern species contained large amounts of C36-C54 alkyl esters, with species-specific homologue distributions. They were accompanied by minor amounts of fatty acids, primary alcohols, aldehydes and/or alkanes, whose chain length profiles also varied widely between species. In the frond wax of G. dryopteris, C27-C33 secondary alcohols and C27-C35 ketones with functional groups exclusively on even-numbered carbons (C-10 to C-16) were identified; these are characteristic structures similar to secondary alcohols and ketones in moss, gymnosperm and basal angiosperm waxes. The ferns had total wax amounts varying from 3.9 ?g cm-2 on P. glycyrrhiza to 16.9 ?g cm-2 on G. dryopteris, thus spanning a range comparable with that on leaves of flowering plants.

Conclusions

The characteristic compound class compositions indicate that all five fern species contain the full complement of wax biosynthesis enzymes previously described for the angiosperm arabidopsis. Based on the isomer profiles, we predict that each fern species, in contrast to arabidopsis, has multiple ester synthase enzymes, each with unique substrate specificities.

SUBMITTER: Guo Y

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6153475 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Coverage and composition of cuticular waxes on the fronds of the temperate ferns Pteridium aquilinum, Cryptogramma crispa, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, Polystichum munitum and Gymnocarpium dryopteris.

Guo Yanjun Y Li Jia Jun JJ Busta Lucas L Jetter Reinhard R

Annals of botany 20180901 4

<h4>Background and aims</h4>The cuticular waxes sealing plant surfaces against excessive water loss are complex mixtures of very-long-chain aliphatics, with compositions that vary widely between plant species. To help fill the gap in our knowledge about waxes of non-flowering plant taxa, and thus about the cuticle of ancestral land plants, this study provides comprehensive analyses of waxes on temperate fern species from five different families.<h4>Methods</h4>The wax mixtures on fronds of Pteri ...[more]

PMID: 30252045

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Project description:BACKGROUND: Because of their phylogenetic position and unique characteristics of their biology and life cycle, ferns represent an important lineage for studying the evolution of land plants. Large and complex genomes in ferns combined with the absence of economically important species have been a barrier to the development of genomic resources. However, high throughput sequencing technologies are now being widely applied to non-model species. We leveraged the Roche 454 GS-FLX Titanium pyrosequencing platform in sequencing the gametophyte transcriptome of bracken fern (Pteridium aquilinum) to develop genomic resources for evolutionary studies. RESULTS: 681,722 quality and adapter trimmed reads totaling 254 Mbp were assembled de novo into 56,256 unique sequences (i.e. unigenes) with a mean length of 547.2 bp and a total assembly size of 30.8 Mbp with an average read-depth coverage of 7.0×. We estimate that 87% of the complete transcriptome has been sequenced and that all transcripts have been tagged. 61.8% of the unigenes had blastx hits in the NCBI nr protein database, representing 22,596 unique best hits. The longest open reading frame in 52.2% of the unigenes had positive domain matches in InterProScan searches. We assigned 46.2% of the unigenes with a GO functional annotation and 16.0% with an enzyme code annotation. Enzyme codes were used to retrieve and color KEGG pathway maps. A comparative genomics approach revealed a substantial proportion of genes expressed in bracken gametophytes to be shared across the genomes of Arabidopsis, Selaginella and Physcomitrella, and identified a substantial number of potentially novel fern genes. By comparing the list of Arabidopsis genes identified by blast with a list of gametophyte-specific Arabidopsis genes taken from the literature, we identified a set of potentially conserved gametophyte specific genes. We screened unigenes for repetitive sequences to identify 548 potentially-amplifiable simple sequence repeat loci and 689 expressed transposable elements. CONCLUSIONS: This study is the first comprehensive transcriptome analysis for a fern and represents an important scientific resource for comparative evolutionary and functional genomics studies in land plants. We demonstrate the utility of high-throughput sequencing of a normalized cDNA library for de novo transcriptome characterization and gene discovery in a non-model plant.

Project description:The neotropical bracken fern Pteridium arachnoideum (Kaulf.) Maxon. (Dennstaedtiaceae) is described as an aggressive pioneer plant species. It invades abandoned or newly burned areas and represents a management challenge at these invaded sites. Native to the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado (Tropical Savanna) Brazilian biomes, P. arachnoideum has nevertheless become very problematic in these conservation hotspots. Despite some reports suggesting a possible role of allelopathy in this plant's dominance, until now there has been little evidence of isolated and individually identified compounds with phytotoxic activities present in its tissues or in the surrounding environment. Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate the allelopathic potential of P. arachnoideum by isolating and identifying any secondary metabolites with phytotoxic activity in its tissues, litter, and soil. Bioguided phytochemical investigation led to the isolation and identification of the proanthocyanidin selligueain A as the major secondary compound in the green fronds and litter of this fern. It is produced by P. arachnoideum in its green fronds, remains unaltered during the senescence process, and is the major secondary compound present in litter. Selligueain A showed phytotoxic activity against the selected target species sesame (Sesamum indicum) early development. In particular, the compound inhibited root and stem growth, and root metaxylem cell size but did not affect chlorophyll content. This compound can be considered as an allelochemical because it is present in the soil under P. arachnoideum patches as one of the major compounds in the soil solution. This is the first report of the presence of selligueain A in any member of the Dennstaedtiaceae family and the first time an isolated and identified allelochemical produced by members of the Pteridium species complex has been described. This evidence of selligueain A as a putative allelochemical of P. arachnoideum reinforces the role of allelopathy in the dominance processes of this plant in the areas where it occurs.

Dataset Information

Coverage and composition of cuticular waxes on the fronds of the temperate ferns Pteridium aquilinum, Cryptogramma crispa, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, Polystichum munitum and Gymnocarpium dryopteris.

Background and aims

Methods

Key results

Conclusions

Publications

Coverage and composition of cuticular waxes on the fronds of the temperate ferns Pteridium aquilinum, Cryptogramma crispa, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, Polystichum munitum and Gymnocarpium dryopteris.

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