Anti-fatigue activity of purified flavonoids prepared from chestnut (Castanea mollissima) flower

Chestnut (Castanea mollissima) is a deciduous tree species with major economic and ecological value that is widely used in the study of floral development in woody plants due its monoecious and out-of-proportion characteristics. Squamosa promoter-binding protein-like (SPL) is a plant-specific transcription factor that plays an important role in floral development. In this study, a total of 18 SPL genes were identified in the chestnut genome, of which 10 SPL genes have complementary regions of CmmiR156. An analysis of the phylogenetic tree of the squamosa promoter-binding protein (SBP) domains of the SPL genes of Arabidopsis thaliana, Populus trichocarpa, and C. mollissima divided these SPL genes into eight groups. The evolutionary relationship between poplar and chestnut in the same group was similar. A structural analysis of the protein-coding regions (CDSs) showed that the domains have the main function of SBP domains and that other domains also play an important role in determining gene function. The expression patterns of CmmiR156 and CmSPLs in different floral organs of chestnut were analyzed by real-time quantitative PCR. Some CmSPLs with similar structural patterns showed similar expression patterns, indicating that the gene structures determine the synergy of the gene functions. The application of gibberellin (GA) and its inhibitor (Paclobutrazol, PP333) to chestnut trees revealed that these exert a significant effect on the number and length of the male and female chestnut flowers. GA treatment significantly increased CmmiR156 expression and thus significantly decreased the expression of its target gene, CmSPL6/CmSPL9/CmSPL16, during floral bud development. This finding indicates that GA might indirectly affect the expression of some of the SPL target genes through miR156. In addition, RNA ligase-mediated rapid amplification of the 5′ cDNA ends (RLM-RACE) experiments revealed that CmmiR156 cleaves CmSPL9 and CmSPL16 at the 10th and 12th bases of the complementary region. These results laid an important foundation for further study of the biological function of CmSPLs in the floral development of C. mollissima.

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Construction of Pseudomolecules for the Chinese Chestnut (Castanea mollissima) Genome

G3 Genes|Genome|Genetics ◽

10.1534/g3.120.401532 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (10) ◽

pp. 3565-3574

Author(s):

Jinping Wang ◽

Shoule Tian ◽

Xiaoli Sun ◽

Xinchao Cheng ◽

Naibin Duan ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Agronomic Traits ◽

Whole Genome Sequence ◽

Comparative Genomic ◽

Ecological Value ◽

Chromosome Conformation ◽

Protein Coding ◽

Chinese Chestnut ◽

Castanea Mollissima ◽

Long Read ◽

Improvement Programs

The Chinese chestnut (Castanea mollissima Bl.) is a woody nut crop with a high ecological value. Although many cultivars have been selected from natural seedlings, elite lines with comprehensive agronomic traits and characters remain rare. To explore genetic resources with aid of whole genome sequence will play important roles in modern breeding programs for chestnut. In this study, we generated a high-quality C. mollissima genome assembly by combining 90× Pacific Biosciences long read and 170× high-throughput chromosome conformation capture data. The assembly was 688.93 Mb in total, with a contig N50 of 2.83 Mb. Most of the assembled sequences (99.75%) were anchored onto 12 chromosomes, and 97.07% of the assemblies were accurately anchored and oriented. A total of 33,638 protein-coding genes were predicted in the C. mollissima genome. Comparative genomic and transcriptomic analyses provided insights into the genes expressed in specific tissues, as well as those associated with burr development in the Chinese chestnut. This highly contiguous assembly of the C. mollissima genome provides a valuable resource for studies aiming at identifying and characterizing agronomical-important traits, and will aid the design of breeding strategies to develop more focused, faster, and predictable improvement programs.

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