GSE112437
Nitrate fertilizer alleviates ammonium toxicity by enhancing ACLA-3 in Panax notoginseng roots
Nitrogen is one of the essential elements for plant growth. NH4+ and NO3- are two major forms of absorbing element N for higher plants. In this study we found that the growth of Panax notoginseng is inhibited when only adding ammonium nitrogen fertilizer, and adding nitrate fertilizer can alleviate the toxicity caused by ammonium. We use RNA-seq to identify genes that are related to the alleviated phenotypes after introducing NO3- to Panax notoginseng roots under NH4+ stresses. Twelve RNA-seq profiles in four sample groups, i.e., control, samples treated with NH4+, samples treated with NO3- only, and treated with both NH4+ and NO3- were obtained and analyzed to identify deregulated genes in samples with different treatments. ACLA-3 gene is downregulated in NH4+ treated samples, but is upregulated in samples treated with NO3- and with both NH4+ and NO3-, which is further validated in another set of samples using qRT-PCR. Our results suggest that unbalanced metabolism of nitrogen and nitrogen is the main cause of ammonium poisoning in roots of Panax notoginseng, and NO3- may significantly upregulate the activity of ACLA-3 which subsequently enhances the citrate cycle and many other metabolic pathways in Panax notoginseng root. These potentially increase the integrity of the Panax notoginseng roots. Our results suggest that introducing NO3- fertilizer is an effective means to prevent the occurrence of toxic ammonium in Panax notoginseng root. Overall design: Illumina sequencing of RNA-seq libraries from 3-day-old seedlings