Abstract
Plant diterpenes such as ginkgolides are biosynthesized via the recently discovered
2-C -methyl-D -erythritol 4-phosphate (MEP) pathway. The initial step of the MEP pathway is the
formation of 1-deoxy-D -xylulose 5-phosphate (DXP) catalyzed by 1-deoxy-D -xylulose 5-phosphate synthase (DXS, EC: 4.1.3.37), which may thus be considered the
first committed step of the MEP pathway for ginkgolides biosynthesis. The full-length
cDNA of DXS was isolated and characterized from the gymnosperm plant species, Ginkgo biloba . The full-length cDNA of GbDXS was 2795 bp containing a 2154 bp open reading frame (ORF) encoding 717 amino acids.
Comparative and bioinformatic analyses revealed that GbDXS has extensive homology
with DXSs from other plant species and, like these, contains a conserved transit peptide
for plastid import, histidine residue, a putative thiamine diphosphate-binding site
and a transketolase motif. Phylogenetic analysis indicates that GbDXS belongs to the
plant DXS1 cluster and suggests it to be more ancient than other plant DXSs. GbDXS was found to be expressed in all tested tissues including roots, stems, leaves, pericarps
and seeds. Expression profiling analyses revealed that GbDXS expression was induced by exogenous elicitors including methyl jasmonate, arachidonic
acid, acetylsalicylic acid and ceric ammonium sulfate, and showed that the transcription
levels were correlated with ginkgolide accumulation, suggesting that DXS might play
a regulatory role in ginkgolide biosynthesis in cell culture of G. biloba at the transcriptional level.
Key words
1-Deoxy-D -xylulose 5-phosphate synthase (DXS) -
Ginkgo biloba
- ginkgolides - biosynthesis - elicitor
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Prof. Ke-xuan Tang
Plant Biotechnology Research Center
Fudan-SJTU-Nottingham Plant Biotechnology R&D Center
School of Agriculture and Biology
Shanghai Jiao Tong University
1954 Huashan Road
Shanghai 200030
People's Republic of China
Phone: +86-21-6293-2002
Fax: +86-21-6282-4073
Email: kxtang1@yahoo.com