title: Group 3 LEA Protein, ZmLEA3, Is Involved in Protection from Low Temperature Stress.
abstract: Late embryogenesis abundant (LEA) proteins are a family of small highly hydrophilic proteins that accumulate at the onset of seed desiccation and in response to adverse conditions such as drought, salinity, low temperature, or water deficit. In previous studies, we demonstrated that ZmLEA3 could enhance the transgenic tobacco tolerance to osmotic and oxidative stresses. Here, we demonstrated that the transcription of ZmLEA3 in the maize stems could be significantly induced by low temperature and osmotic stresses and by treatment with abscisic acid (ABA) and H2O2. Further study indicated that ZmLEA3 is a single copy gene in the maize genome. The ZmLEA3 protein could protect lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) activity at low temperatures. The overexpression of ZmLEA3 conferred tolerance to low-temperature stress to transgenic tobacco, yeast (GS115) and E. coli (BL21).
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, Shandong Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, College of Life Sciences, Shandong Agricultural University Tai'an, China.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, Shandong Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, College of Life Sciences, Shandong Agricultural University Tai'an, China.
authors.forename: Jianan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Taishan Medical University Tai'an, China.
authors.forename: Liping
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, Shandong Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, College of Life Sciences, Shandong Agricultural University Tai'an, China.
authors.forename: Xinghong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, Shandong Key Laboratory of Crop Biology, College of Life Sciences, Shandong Agricultural University Tai'an, China.
authors.forename: Dequan
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Li
keywords: LEA protein; ZmLEA3; low-temperature stress; maize; transgenic gene