Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL BOTANY
Volume 68, Issue 11, Pages 2731-2739Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/jxb/erx138
Keywords
Arabidopsis thaliana; development; intron; quatre-quart (QQT1); splicing; U12 intron
Categories
Funding
- Mid-career Researcher Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea - Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, Republic of Korea [NRF-2016R1A2B4009172]
- Next-Generation BioGreen21 Program, Rural Development Administration, Republic of Korea [PJ01105401]
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Despite increasing understanding of the importance of the splicing of U12-type introns in plant development, the key question of which U12 intron-containing genes are essential for plant development has not yet been explored. Here, we assessed the functional role of the quatre-quart1 (QQT1) gene, one of the similar to 230 U12 intron-containing genes in Arabidopsis thaliana. Expression of QQT1 in the U11/U12-31K small nuclear ribonucleoprotein mutant (31k) rescued the developmental-defect phenotypes of the 31k mutant, whereas the miRNA-mediated qqt1 knockdown mutants displayed severe defects in growth and development, including severely arrested stem growth, small size, and the formation of serrated leaves. The structures of the shoot apical meristems in the qqt1 mutants were abnormal and disordered. Identification of QQT1-interacting proteins via a yeast two-hybrid screening and a firefly luciferase complementation-imaging assay revealed that a variety of proteins, including many chloroplast-targeted proteins, interacted with QQT1. Importantly, the levels of chloroplast-targeted proteins in the chloroplast were reduced, and the chloroplast structure was abnormal in the qqt1 mutant. Collectively, these results provide clear evidence that QQT1 is an indispensable U12 intron-containing gene whose correct splicing is crucial for the normal development of Arabidopsis.
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