A Splice Variant of in Turnip ( var. rapa) and Its Possible Role in Wax Ester Synthesis under Drought Stress.

Cuticular wax accumulation in plants contributes to drought tolerance. Here, we compared the drought levels on two varieties with different genotypes in turnip ( var. rapa) and found that the drought tolerance was higher in the waxy KTRG-B48a than in the wax-free KTRG-B48b. A combination of PacBio and Illumina sequencing analyses revealed that differential transcripts were mainly enriched in the wax synthesis pathway, and a splice variant () was identified in the waxy KTRG-B48a. had a stronger ability to synthesize wax esters than using heterologous expression in yeast () mutant H1246a. Then, we speculated that the T to C transversion of the third intron and the higher number of TA repeats in the third intron of DNA in the waxy KTRG-B48a may result in a lower efficiency of splicing recognition of the third intron, resulting in the emergence of in waxy varieties.