Very bright orange fluorescent plants: endoplasmic reticulum targeting of orange fluorescent proteins as visual reporters in transgenic plants

BMC Biotechnology

Research Article

Reggie J Millwood¹  Mary R Rudis¹  C Neal Stewart²  David GJ Mann²  Laura L Abercrombie²  John R Dunlap³ 

[1] Department of Plant Sciences, University of Tennessee, 37996, Knoxville, TN, USA;Department of Plant Sciences, University of Tennessee, 37996, Knoxville, TN, USA;BioEnergy Science Center, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 37831, Oak Ridge, TN, USA;Division of Biology, University of Tennessee, 37996, Knoxville, TN, USA;

关键词: Endoplasmic reticulum targeting;    Fluorescent proteins;    GFP;    Marker genes;    OFP;    Orange fluorescent protein;    Reporter genes;    RFP;    Subcellular localization;    Transgenic plants;    Visual markers;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6750-12-17

 received in 2012-01-11, accepted in 2012-04-25,  发布年份 2012

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe expression of fluorescent protein (FP) genes as real-time visual markers, both transiently and stably, has revolutionized plant biotechnology. A palette of colors of FPs is now available for use, but the diversity has generally been underutilized in plant biotechnology. Because of the green and far-red autofluorescent properties of many plant tissues and the FPs themselves, red and orange FPs (RFPs, and OFPs, respectfully) appear to be the colors with maximum utility in plant biotechnology. Within the color palette OFPs have emerged as the brightest FP markers in the visible spectra. This study compares several native, near-native and modified OFPs for their “brightness” and fluorescence, therefore, their usability as marker genes in transgenic plant tissues.ResultsThe OFPs DsRed2, tdTomato, mOrange and pporRFP were all expressed under the control of the CaMV 35S promoter in agroinfiltration-mediated transient assays in Nicotiana benthamiana. Each of these, as well as endoplasmic reticulum (ER)-targeted versions, were stably expressed in transgenic Nicotiana tabacum and Arabidopsis thaliana. Congruent results were observed between transient and stable assays. Our results demonstrated that there are several adequate OFP genes available for plant transformation, including the new pporRFP, an unaltered tetramer from the hard coral Porites porites. When the tandem dimer tdTomato and the monomeric mOrange were targeted to the ER, dramatic, ca. 3-fold, increase in plant fluorescence was observed.ConclusionsFrom our empirical data, and a search of the literature, it appears that tdTomato-ER and mOrange-ER are the two highest fluorescing FPs available as reporters for transgenic plants. The pporRFP is a brightly fluorescing tetramer, but all tetramer FPs are far less bright than the ER-targeted monomers we report here.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Mann et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2012. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.