title: Molecular characterization of four ADF genes differentially expressed in cotton.
abstract: Actin depolymerizing factor (ADF), highly conserved in all eukaryotic cells, is a low molecular mass of actin-binding protein, which plays a key role in modulating the polymerizing and depolymerizing of the actin filaments. Four cDNAs (designated GhADF2, GhADF3, GhADF4, and GhADF5, respectively) encoding ADF proteins were isolated from cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) fiber cDNA library. GhADF2 cDNA is 705 bp in length and deduces a protein with 139 amino acids. GhADF3 cDNA is 819 bp in length and encodes a protein of 139 amino acids. GhADF4 cDNA is 804 bp in length and deduces a protein with 143 amino acids. GhADF5 cDNA is 644 bp in length and encodes a protein of 141 amino acids. The molecular evolutionary relationship of these genes was analyzed by means of bioinformatics. GhADF2 is closely related to GhADF3 (99% identity) and PetADF2 (89% identity). GhADF4 is closely related to AtADF6 (78% identity), and GhADF5 is closely related to AtADF5 (83% identity). These results demonstrated that the plant ADF genes are highly conserved in structure. RT-PCR analysis showed that GhADF2 is predominantly expressed in fiber, whereas, GhADF5 is mainly expressed in cotyledons. On the other hand, it seems that GhADF3 and GhADF4 have no tissue specificity. Expression levels of different ADF genes may vary considerably in the same cell type, suggesting that they might be involved in regulating tissue development of cotton and the each ADF isoform may diverge to form the functional difference from the other ADFs during evolution.
authors.affiliation: College of Life Science, Central China Normal University, Wuhan 430079, China.
authors.forename: Chengwei
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Linlin
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Xiulan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Hui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Haiyan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.forename: Wenliang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Xuebao
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D051339:Actin Depolymerizing Factors / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics*; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; D015723:Gene Library; D003368:Gossypium / Q000166:cytology / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D017385:Sequence Homology
chemical_list: D051339:Actin Depolymerizing Factors