Increased tolerance to organic xenobiotics following recent allopolyploidy in Spartina (Poaceae)

Genome doubling or polyploidy is a widespread phenomenon in plants where it has important evolutionary consequences affecting the species distribution and ecology. PAHs are ubiquitous organic pollutants, which represent a major environmental concern. Recent data showed that tolerance to organic xenobiotics involve specific signaling pathways, and detoxifying gene sets referred as ‘the xenome’. However, no data are available about how polyploidy impacts tolerance to organic xenobiotics. In the present paper, we investigated PAH tolerance following allopolyploidization in Spartina alterniflora, S. maritima and their derived allopolyploid species S. anglica. We performed comparative analyses of cellular compartmentalization, photosynthetic indices, and oxidative stress markers under phenanthrene-induced stress, and found that S. anglica exhibit increased tolerance compared to its parents. Based on 52 genes potentially involved in phenanthrene detoxification previously identified in A. thaliana, we investigated the Spartina xenome using genomic and transcriptomic available resources. Subsequently, we focused on GSTs, a ubiquitous enzymes class involved in organic xenobiotic detoxification. We examined expression profiles of selected genes by RT-qPCR, and revealed various patterns of parental expression alteration in the allopolyploid. The impacts of allopolyploidization on phenanthrene-induced stress and their potential ecological implications are discussed. The neo-allopolyploid S. anglica appears as a potential candidate for phytoremediation in PAH-polluted marshes.