Analysis of Arabidopsis thaliana HKT1 and Eutrema salsugineum/botschantzevii HKT1;2 Promoters in Response to Salt Stress in Athkt1:1 Mutant

Soil salinity imposes a serious threat to the productivity of agricultural crops. Among several other transporters, high-affinity K+ transporter (HKT)’s play an important role in reducing the phytotoxicity of Na+. Expression of Eutrema salsugineum (a halophyte) HKT1;2 is induced upon salt exposure. To elucidate the role of its promoter, we compared the sequences of HKT1;2 promoters from E. salsugineum (1822 bp) and E. botschantzevii (1811 bp) with Arabidopsis thaliana HKT1;1 (846 bp) promoter. In silico analysis predicted several cis-acting regulatory elements (GT-1 elements, core motifs of DRE/CRT, MYC/MYB-recognition sites and ACGT elements). Activities of the three promoters were analyzed by measuring HKT1;1 and/or HKT1;2 transcript level in the Athkt1;1 mutant plants. NaCl tolerance of the transgenics was also assessed. Our results depicted that expressing either AtHKT1;1 or EsHKT1;2 coding regions under the control of AtHKT1;1 promoter, almost reversed the hypersensitivity of the mutant for salt, on contrarily, when AtHKT1;1 coding sequence expressed under either Es or EbHKT1;2 promoters did not. Changes in shoot Na+/K+ concentrations under salt exposure is significantly consistent with the complementation ability of the mutant. The transcript concentration for genes under the control of either of Eutrema promoters, at control level was very less. This may suggest that either an important upstream response motif is missed or that A. thaliana misses a transcriptional regulator that is essential for salt-inducible HKT1 expression in Eutrema.