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© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Abiotic and biotic stresses can lead to changes in host DNA methylation, which in plants is also mediated by an RNA-directed DNA methylation mechanism. Infections with viroids have been shown to affect DNA methylation dynamics in different plant hosts. The aim of our research was to determine the content of 5-methylcytosine (5-mC) in genomic DNA at the whole genome level of hop plants (Humulus lupulus Var. ‘Celeia’) infected with different viroids and their combinations and to analyse the expression of the selected genes to improve our understanding of DNA methylation dynamics in plant-viroid systems. The adapted HPLC-UV method used proved to be suitable for this purpose, and thus we were able to estimate for the first time that the cytosine methylation level in viroid-free hop plants was 26.7%. Interestingly, the observed 5-mC level was the lowest in hop plants infected simultaneously with CBCVd, HLVd and HSVd (23.7%), whereas the highest level was observed in plants infected with HLVd (31.4%). In addition, we identified three DNA methylases and one DNA demethylase gene in the hop’s draft genome. The RT-qPCR revealed upregulation of all newly identified genes in hop plants infected with all three viroids, while no altered expression was observed in any of the other hop plants tested, except for CBCVd-infected hop plants, in which one DNA methylase was also upregulated.

Details

Title
Cytosine Methylation in Genomic DNA and Characterization of DNA Methylases and Demethylases and Their Expression Profiles in Viroid-Infected Hop Plants (Humulus lupulus Var. ‘Celeia’)
Author
Sečnik, Andrej 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Štajner, Nataša 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Radišek, Sebastjan 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Urban Kunej 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Križman, Mitja 3 ; Jakše, Jernej 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

 Department of Agronomy, Biotechnical Faculty, University of Ljubljana, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia 
 Plant Protection Department, Slovenian Institute of Hop Research and Brewing, 3310 Žalec, Slovenia 
 Laboratory for Food Chemistry, National Institute of Chemistry, Hajdrihova 19, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia 
First page
2592
Publication year
2022
Publication date
2022
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
20734409
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2706114280
Copyright
© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.