Identification Of Grapevine Basic Pentacysteine Transcription Factors And Functional Characterization Of Vvbpc1 In Ovule Development

AbstractThe BASIC PENTACYSTEINE (BPC) is a small plant transcription factors that have been identified in variety of plant species, however, the gene members and regulatory mechanisms are poorly reported in grapevine. In this study, four grapevine (Vitis vinifera L) BPC members were excavated and classified into two group. During grape ovule development, the similar expression pattern of four grape BPC genes were observed in four cultivars and all of them were relatively high expressed in the ovule of seedless grape, suggesting that BPC family may have redundant functions and play a certain role in ovule abortion. Due to the functional overlap, Slbpc1 single mutant could not result in aberrant phenotypes. Assays in yeast cells indicated that VvBPC1 interacts with VvBELL1. Meanwhile, in our study, VvAGL11 as the major gene of ovule development in grape orthologous to Arabidopsis STK, which has been proved to be a target of VvBPC1 and be negatively regulated. The small seeds are produced by heterologous overexpression of VvBPC1 in tomato could result from inhibition of AGL11 expression. Taken together, our results give fundamental information on the BPC family genes and provide the basis for further studies to understand the mechanisms that regulate ovule development associated with VvBPC1 in grape.