Photosynthetica, 2013 (vol. 51), issue 2

Photosynthetica 2013, 51(2):238-244 | DOI: 10.1007/s11099-013-0014-5

Enhancement of low-temperature tolerance in transgenic tomato plants overexpressing Lefad7 through regulation of trienoic fatty acids

X. Y. Liu1, Y. B. Teng1, B. Li2, Q. W. Meng2,*
1 College of Life and Environmental Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, P. R. China
2 College of Life Science, State Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, Shandong Agricultural University, Tai'an, P. R. China

We studied how tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill.) chloroplast omega-3 fatty acid desaturase gene (Lefad7) overexpression enhanced low-temperature (LT) tolerance in transgenic tomato plants. In these plants, the content of linolenic acid (18:3) markedly increased and, correspondingly, the content of linoleic acid (18:2) decreased. Similar changes were found after 6 h under LT (4°C) treatment. Under LT stress, wild type (WT) tomato plants showed a much greater increase in relative electrolyte leakage and malondialdehyde (MDA) contents compared with transgenic plants. Transgenic plants exhibited higher activities of antioxidative enzymes and a lower content of reactive oxygen species (ROS). Transgenic plants maintained a relatively higher level of the net photosynthetic rate (P N) and chlorophyll (Chl) content than WT plants under LT stress. Taken together, we suggested that overexpression of Lefad7 enhanced LT tolerance by changing the composition of membrane lipids in tomato plants, with the increased content of trienoic fatty acids and reduced content of dienoic fatty acids that led to series of physiological alterations.

Keywords: chloroplast omega-3 fatty acid desaturase gene; Lycopersicon esculentum

Received: December 8, 2011; Accepted: November 28, 2012; Published: June 1, 2013Show citation

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Liu, X.Y., Teng, Y.B., Li, B., & Meng, Q.W. (2013). Enhancement of low-temperature tolerance in transgenic tomato plants overexpressing Lefad7 through regulation of trienoic fatty acids. Photosynthetica, 51(2), 238-244. doi: 10.1007/s11099-013-0014-5.
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