Project description:Pineapple is a non climacteric fruit. This study investigates changes in gene expression between the mature green fruit and mature yellow fruit ripening stages
Project description:DNA methylation is a conserved epigenetic mark that influences diverse biological processes in many eukaryotes. Recently, DNA methylation was proposed to regulate fleshy fruit ripening. Fleshy fruits can be distinguished by their ripening process as climacteric fruits, such as tomatoes, or non-climacteric fruits, such as strawberries. Tomatoes undergo a global decrease in DNA methylation during ripening, due to increased expression of a DNA demethylase gene. The dynamics and biological relevance of DNA methylation during ripening of non-climacteric fruits, or other climacteric fruits, are unknown. Here, we generated and characterized single-base resolution maps of the DNA methylome in strawberry fruit, from immature to ripe stages. We observed an overall loss of DNA methylation during strawberry fruit ripening. Thus, ripening-induced DNA hypomethylation occurs not only in climacteric fruit, but also in non-climacteric fruit. However, we discovered that the mechanisms underlying DNA hypomethylation during ripening of tomato and strawberry are distinct. Unlike in tomatoes, DNA demethylase genes were not up-regulated during ripening of strawberries. Instead, genes involved in RNA-directed DNA methylation were down-regulated during strawberry ripening. Further, ripening-induced DNA hypomethylation was associated with decreased siRNA levels, consistent with reduced RdDM activity. Therefore, we propose that DNA hypomethylation during strawberry ripening is caused by diminished RdDM activity. Finally, hundreds of ripening-related genes displayed altered expression that was associated with, and thus potentially regulated by, DNA hypomethylation during ripening. Our findings provide new insight into the DNA methylation dynamics during the ripening of non-climateric fruit and reveal a novel function of RdDM in regulating an important process in plant development.
Project description:In contrast to climacteric fruits such as tomato, the knowledge on key regulatory genes controlling the ripening of strawberry, a non-climacteric fruit, is still limited. NAC transcription factors mediate different developmental processes in plants. Here, we identified and characterized FaRIF (Ripening Inducing Factor), a NAC transcription factor that is highly expressed and induced in strawberry receptacles during ripening. Functional analyses based on stable transgenic lines aimed at silencing FaRIF by RNA interference, either from a constitutive promoter or the ripe receptacle-specific EXP2 promoter, as well as overexpression lines showed that FaRIF controls critical ripening-related processes such as fruit softening and pigment and sugar accumulation. Physiological, metabolome and transcriptome analyses of receptacles of FaRIF-silenced and overexpression lines point to FaRIF as a key regulator of strawberry fruit ripening from early developmental stages, controlling abscisic acid (ABA) biosynthesis and signaling, cell wall degradation and modification, the phenylpropanoid pathway, volatiles production, and the balance of the aerobic/anaerobic metabolism. FaRIF is therefore a target to be modified/edited to control the quality of strawberry fruits.
Project description:We used Illumina sequencing to investigate the global transcriptomic expression of hormonal pathway genes in ABA initiated strawberry receptacle ripening. Expression profiles of hormone synthetic and signaling genes further demonstrated the positive roles of ABA and GA, and the negative role of auxin in receptacle ripening. We also evaluated the transcript profiling of ethylene and JA pathway genes, and the results suggested that both ethylene and JA participated in receptacle ripening. Furthermore, two novel miRNAs and three conserved miRNAs were identified and validated to target genes in ABA and auxin pathways, respectively. Our analyses reveal the molecular mechanism of hormonal regulation during strawberry receptacle ripening. The data also provide an abundant of genetic information for molecular manipulation on non-climacteric fruit ripening. Sample 1: CK0 (Strawberry fruit two weeks after athesis treated with water, set as day 0); Sample 2: CK5 (fruit treated with water on day 5); Sample 3: CK8 (fruit treated with water on day 8); Sample 4: ABA5 (fruit treated with ABA on day 5); Sample 5: ABA8 (fruit treated with ABA on day 5); Sample 6: NDGA5 (fruit treated with water on day 5); Sample 7: NDGA8 (fruit treated with NDGA on day 8).
Project description:Kumquat (Fortunella classifolia Swingle) was thought as a close relative to citrus according to fruit morphology taxonomic, but kumquat fruit as well as its flowering characteristic are distinct from other citrus species, the trees usually blooms on the medium of June, obviously later than other citrus species, moreover many kumquat accessions could be blossom more than one times during one growth season, as this reason, the kumquat fruits could be consecutively ripen over several months, which made the study of globe genes expression profile for different development stage fruit easy. Kumquat is non-climacteric fruit, however the kumquat fruit ripening process, especially genes expression change in young and ripe kumquat fruits are less known, so studying on the global genes expression profiles of kumquat fruits in young and ripe stage are especially helpful to identify ripening-related genes and unravel the mechanism of ripening process.
Project description:The study of climacteric fruit ripening in tomato has been facilitated by the spontaneous ripening mutants Colorless non-ripening (Cnr), non-ripening (nor), and ripening inhibitor (rin). These mutants effect the genes encoding ripening transcription factors (TFs) SPL-CNR, NAC-NOR, and MADS-RIN causing pleiotropic defects to the ripening program. Here, we demonstrate that some ripening processes occur in the mutant fruit but at later stages of development compared to the wild type. The rin and nor mutant fruit exhibit similar quality traits to wildtype at later stages of ripening and senescence and delayed expression of ripening-associated genes. In addition, we propose that the Cnr mutant has a broader range of effects to fruit development than just fruit ripening. Cnr fruit show distinct differences from wild type in ripening phenotypic traits and gene expression profiles prior to the initiation of ripening. We provide new evidence that some mutants can produce more ethylene than basal levels and demonstrate ABA accumulation is also affected by the mutations. Studies have examined the relationship between the CNR, RIN, and NOR TFs based on protein-protein interactions and transcriptional regulation during fruit ripening. We describe the genetic interactions affecting specific fruit traits by using homozygous double mutants. Cnr predominantly influences the phenotype of the Cnr/nor and Cnr/rin double mutants but additional defects beyond either single mutation is evident in the transcriptome of the Cnr/nor double mutant. Our reevaluation of the Cnr, nor, and rin mutants provides new insights the utilization of the mutants in breeding and studying fruit development.
Project description:Papaya (Carica papaya L.) is a typical climacteric fruit, undergoing massive physico-chemical changes during ripening. Although papaya is widely cultivated and consumed, few studies have characterized the variations in metabolism during its ripening process at the proteasome level. Using an integrated approach involving Tandem Mass Tag labeling and liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry analysis, proteomes of papaya fruit at different ripening stages were investigated. A total of 3220 proteins were identified, of which 2818 were quantified. The differential accumulated proteins (DAPs) exhibited various biological functions and diverse subcellular localizations. Among the DEPs, most of the pathogen defense-related proteins were down-regulated, suggesting that disease resistance decreased during the ripening process. The Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes enrichment analysis revealed that various metabolic pathways were significantly altered, particularly in flavonoid and fatty acid metabolisms. The up-regulation of several flavonoid biosynthesis-related proteins may provide more raw materials for pigment biosynthesis, accelerating the color variation of papaya fruit. Thus, variations in the fatty acid metabolism-related enzymes were investigated. For example, a lipoxygenase, which catalyzes the conversion of ACC to ethylene, was significantly induced, suggesting a cross-talk between the lipoxygenase-mediated fatty acid metabolism and the hormone-controlled fruit ripening in papaya. Furthermore, the contents of several important fatty acids were determined, and increased unsaturated fatty acids may be associated with papaya fruit volatile formation. Our data may give an intrinsic explanation of the variations in metabolism during the ripening process of papaya fruit and serve as a comprehensive resource for investigating the regulation mechanism involved.