Molecular and phenotypic analyses of Arabidopsis thaliana plants overexpressing AtMo25-1 gene

Abstract

Cell polarity and morphogenesis are two important processes during cell differentiation and for the development of eukaryotes. Several cellular events depend on cell polarity such as vesicle trafficking and asymmetric cell division such as budding in yeasts. In the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, one of the signaling pathways that controls and maintains cell morphogenesis and polarity is the RAM network (Regulation of Ace2p activity and cellular Morphogenesis). In other fungi and eukaryotes, its corresponding network is known as MOR network (Morphogenesis Orb6 Network). Mo25 (Hym1 homolog in S. cerevisiae) is a scaffold protein conserved in eukaryotes and participates in the RAM/MOR network. One of the roles of Mo25 is its function in the tumor suppressor complex LKB1/STRAD/MO25 in mammals. A few studies have been done on the RAM/MOR network in plants. It was suggested that this network is involved in the pollen tube growth, via polarized cell growth, and cell differentiation. Our unpublished data showed that AtMo25-1, one of the four AtMo25 paralogs from Arabidopsis thaliana, is expressed in wounded leaves and that plants with lower AtMo25-1 transcripts result in the delay of pollen tube growth, both processes dependent on cytoskeleton reorganization and cell asymmetry. Another way to check AtMo25-1 function is to study plants with higher levels of AtMo25-1 transcripts (plants overexpressing AtMo25-1, or AtMo25-1OX). The goal of this project is to select AtMo25-1OX plants from a pool of transformed plants (T0), evaluate AtMo25-1 expression level in these plants and perform phenotypic analyses comparing AtMo25-1OX to wild type (control) plants.