Label-free quantitative proteomic analysis of tolerance to drought in Pisum sativum

Abiotic stresses caused by adverse environmental conditions are responsible for heavy economic losses on pea crop, being drought one of the most important abiotic constraints. Development of pea cultivars well adapted to dry conditions has been one of the major tasks in breeding programs. The increasing food requirements drive the necessity to broaden the molecular basis of tolerance to drought to develop pea cultivars well adapted to dry conditions. We have used a shotgun proteomic approach (nLC-MSMS) to study the tolerance to drought in three pea genotypes that were selected based on differences in the level of water deficit tolerance. Multivariate statistical analysis of data unraveled 367 significant differences of 700 identified when genotypes and/or treatment were compared. More than half of the significantly changed proteins belong to primary metabolism and protein regulation categories. We propose different mechanisms to cope drought in the genotypes studied. Maintenance of the primary metabolism and protein protection seems a strategy for drought tolerance. On the other hand susceptibility might be related to maintenance of the homeostatic equilibrium, a very energy consuming process. Data are available via ProteomeXchange with identifier PXD004587.