SlHDA5, a Tomato Histone Deacetylase Gene, Is Involved in Responding to Salt, Drought, and ABA

Histone deacetylation catalyzed by histone deacetylases is an important type of histone modification. Histone deacetylases affect various processes of plant development and involve in responding to hormones and biotic and abiotic stresses. Here, we report a tomato PRD3/HDA1 histone deacetylase gene, SlHDA5, which is expressed ubiquitously in different tissues and development stages. Expression profiles in hormone treatments showed that SlHDA5 was induced by abscisic acid (ABA) and methyl jasmonate (MeJA). Seedlings growth of SlHDA5-RNAi lines were more inhibited on the medium containing salt compared with wild type (WT). Under salt stress, chlorophyll in mature leaves degraded earlier in transgenic leaves than that in WT, and transgenic plants displayed wilting earlier and more severe than WT. After drought treatment, transgenic plants wilted and dehydrated earlier than WT, which was confirmed by lower water and chlorophyll content, and higher malondialdehyde (MDA) content in transgenic plants manifesting that the tolerance of transgenic plants to drought receded. Under the treatment of ABA, root length of transgenic seedlings was more strongly repressed by contrast with WT, suggesting repression of SlHDA5 increased seedling sensibility to ABA. Our study indicated that silencing of SlHDA5 resulted in decreasing tolerance to salt, drought, and ABA.