Background
Soybean grain is an important oil crop with high-quality vegetable protein and vegetable oil. Extreme weather can cause crop yield reduction, among which drought is most likely to cause a decline in annual soybean yield. How to overcome the impact of drought on soybean yield has become a major work in current breeding research.
Results
In our study, the gene GmELF4-LIKE4 was obtained through RNA-Seq and differential gene screening technology, and the plant over expression vector and RNAi vector were constructed. Then, the Colombian Arabidopsis thaliana and soybean JN18 were genetically transformed and added to the Agrobacterium-mediated method in to T2 generation. We have verified in Arabidopsis thaliana that over expression of ELF4-LIKE4 will delay the flowering of Arabidopsis thaliana, while inhibition of ELF4-LIKE4 expression will advance the flowering period. At the same time, we verified the regulation analysis of GmELF4-LIKE4 on EARLY FLOWERING 3 and CONSTANTS-like in soybeans, and found that GmELF4-LIKE4 positively regulates ELF3 and COL; meanwhile, over expression soybeans and RNAi soybeans were tested in drought. Stressing the relative conductivity, malondialdehyde content and peroxidase activity under 0 days and 5 days, the result indicate that the over expression of GmELF4-LIKE4 gene can reduce the drought resistance of soybean. This study laid a theoretical foundation for the identification of GmELF4-LIKE4 gene function and the breeding of drought-resistant varieties.
Conclusion
We found that overexpression of GmELF4-LIKE4 will delay the flowering period of Arabidopsis thaliana and reduce the drought resistance of soybeans. Conversely, inhibiting GmELF4-LIKE4 will advance the flowering of Arabidopsis thaliana and increase the drought resistance of soybeans.