Heterologous expression of gene in hairy roots and its role in secondary metabolism under PEG-induced osmotic stress condition in L.

Unlabelled: This study explores the gene () family along with expression in hairy roots of . 42 were identified by detecting three conserved domains: Cu-oxidase, Cu oxidase-2, and Cu oxidase-3. The physicochemical properties show that AaLacs are proteins with 541-1075 amino acids. These proteins are stable, with an instability index less than 40. Phylogenetic and motif studies have shown structural variants in , suggesting functional divergence. 22 -regulatory elements were selected for their roles in drought stress, metabolic modulations, defense, and stress responses. A comparison of AtLac and AaLac proteins showed that 11 mitigates stress reactions. In silico expression, analysis of 11 showed that may function under osmotic stress. Thus, the Homolog was selected by expression profiling. The real-time PCR results showed that enhances osmotic stress tolerance in shoot and root samples. It was also used to analyze , and gene expression in hairy roots via induction. The transformed hairy roots exhibited a greater capacity for PEG-induced osmotic stress tolerance in contrast to the untransformed roots. The gene expression analysis also depicted a significant increment in expression of , and genes to 3.8, 6.9, and 3.1 folds respectively. The transformed hairy roots exhibited a significant increase of 2.2 and 1.4 fold in flavonoid and phenolic content respectively. Also, lignin content and artemisinin content increased by 7.05 folds and 95.6% with respect to the control. Thus, transformed hairy roots of under PEG-induced osmotic stress demonstrate the involvement of the gene in stress responses, lignin biosynthesis, and secondary metabolism production.

Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12298-024-01516-8.