Somatic mobility of the maize element Ac and its utility for gene tagging in aspen

Ac/Ds-transposon activation tagging in poplar: a powerful tool for gene discovery

BACKGROUND

Rapid improvements in the development of new sequencing technologies have led to the availability of genome sequences of more than 300 organisms today. Thanks to bioinformatic analyses, prediction of gene models and protein-coding transcripts has become feasible. Various reverse and forward genetics strategies have been followed to determine the functions of these gene models and regulatory sequences. Using T-DNA or transposons as tags, significant progress has been made by using "Knock-in" approaches ("gain-of-function" or "activation tagging") in different plant species but not in perennial plants species, e.g. long-lived trees. Here, large scale gene tagging resources are still lacking.

RESULTS

We describe the first application of an inducible transposon-based activation tagging system for a perennial plant species, as example a poplar hybrid (P. tremula L. × P. tremuloides Michx.). Four activation-tagged populations comprising a total of 12,083 individuals derived from 23 independent "Activation Tagging Ds" (ATDs) transgenic lines were produced and phenotyped. To date, 29 putative variants have been isolated and new ATDs genomic positions were successfully determined for 24 of those. Sequences obtained were blasted against the publicly available genome sequence of P. trichocarpa v2.0 (Phytozome v7.0; http://www.phytozome.net/poplar) revealing possible transcripts for 17 variants.In a second approach, 300 randomly selected individuals without any obvious phenotypic alterations were screened for ATDs excision. For one third of those transposition of ATDs was confirmed and in about 5% of these cases genes were tagged.

CONCLUSIONS

The novel strategy of first genotyping and then phenotyping a tagging population as proposed here is, in particular, applicable for long-lived, difficult to transform plant species. We could demonstrate the power of the ATDs transposon approach and the simplicity to induce ATDs transposition in vitro. Since a transposon is able to pass chromosomal boundaries, only very few primary transposon-carrying transgenic lines are required for the establishment of large transposon tagging populations. In contrast to T-DNA-based activation tagging, which is plagued by a lack of transformation efficiency and its time consuming nature, this for the first time, makes it feasible one day to tag (similarly to Arabidopsis) every gene within a perennial plant genome.

An Ac/Ds-mediated gene trap system for functional genomics in barley

Background

Gene trapping is a powerful tool for gene discovery and functional genomics in both animals and plants. Upon insertion of the gene trap construct into an expressed gene, splice donor and acceptor sites facilitate the generation of transcriptional fusions between the flanking sequence and the reporter. Consequently, detection of reporter gene expression allows the identification of genes based on their expression pattern. Up to now rice is the only cereal crop for which gene trap approaches exist. In this study we describe a gene trap system in barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) based on the maize transposable elements Ac/Ds.

Results

We generated gene trap barley lines by crossing Ac transposase expressing plants with multiple independent transformants carrying the Ds based gene trap construct GTDsB. Upstream of the β-Glucuronidase start codon GTDsB carries splice donor and acceptor sites optimized for monocotyledonous plants. DNA blot analysis revealed GTDsB transposition frequencies of 11% and 26% in the F₁ and F₂ generation of gene trap lines and perpetuation of transposition activity in later generations. Furthermore, analysis of sequences flanking transposed GTDsB elements evidenced preferential insertion into expressed regions of the barley genome. We screened leaves, nodes, immature florets, pollinated florets, immature grains and seedlings of F₂ plants and detected GUS expression in 51% (72/141) of the plants. Thus, reporter gene expression was found in 24 of the 28 F₁ lines tested and in progeny of all GTDsB parental lines.

Conclusion

Due to the frequent transposition of GTDsB and the efficient expression of the GUS reporter gene, we conclude that this Ac/Ds-based gene trap system is an applicable approach for gene discovery in barley. The successful introduction of a gene trap construct optimized for monocots in barley contributes a novel functional genomics tool for this cereal crop.

Activation tagging in plants: a tool for gene discovery

A significant limitation of classical loss-of-function screens designed to dissect genetic pathways is that they rarely uncover genes that function redundantly, are compensated by alternative metabolic or regulatory circuits, or which have an additional role in early embryo or gametophyte development. Activation T-DNA tagging is one approach that has emerged in plants to help circumvent these potential problems. This technique utilises a T-DNA sequence that contains four tandem copies of the cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV) 35S enhancer sequence. This element enhances the expression of neighbouring genes either side of the randomly integrated T-DNA tag, resulting in gain-of-function phenotypes. Activation tagging has identified a number of genes fundamental to plant development, metabolism and disease resistance in Arabidopsis. This review provides selected examples of these discoveries to highlight the utility of this technology. The recent development of activation tagging strategies for other model plant systems and the construction of new more sophisticated vectors for the generation of conditional alleles are also discussed. These recent advances have significantly expanded the horizons for gain-of-function genetics in plants.

Potato virus X-induced gene silencing in leaves and tubers of potato

Virus induced gene silencing (VIGS) is increasingly used to generate transient loss-of-function assays and has potential as a powerful reverse-genetics tool in functional genomic programs as a more rapid alternative to stable transformation. A previously described potato virus X (PVX) VIGS vector has been shown to trigger silencing in the permissive host Nicotiana benthamiana. This paper demonstrates that a PVX-based VIGS vector is also effective in triggering a VIGS response in both diploid and cultivated tetraploid Solanum species. We show that systemic silencing of a phytoene desaturase gene is observed and maintained throughout the foliar tissues of potato plants and was also observed in tubers. Here we report that VIGS can be triggered and sustained on in vitro micropropagated tetraploid potato for several cycles and on in vitro generated microtubers. This approach will facilitate large-scale functional analysis of potato expressed sequence tags and provide a noninvasive reverse-genetic approach to study mechanisms involved in tuber and microtuber development.