ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Abiotic Stress
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpls.2025.1581542
This article is part of the Research TopicUtilizing Advanced Genomics and Biochemical Tools to Strengthen Crop Adaptation for Biotic and Abiotic StressesView all 6 articles
Novel and conserved drought-responsive microRNAs expression analysis of root tissues in wheat (Triticum asetivum L.) at reproductive stage
Provisionally accepted
- Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley Research (ICAR), Karnal, India
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microRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of 20- to 24 nucleotides endogenous small RNAs that repress gene expression post-transcriptionally and thus control plant development and stress response. Drought stress (DS) is one of the most important abiotic factors that severely affect the yield of commercially important crop wheat. To identify drought-responsive miRNAs in wheat, we constructed small RNA libraries from drought-tolerant (NI5439) and susceptible (WL711) wheat genotypes grown under control and drought-stress conditions. In the present investigation, we identified 306 known and 58 novel microRNAs from NI-5439 and WL-711 wheat genotypes. Family distribution analysis showed the identified miRNA belongs to more than 18 different families in which the-miR9662a-3p was the most abundant. The most prominent length of miRNA was 21 nts regulating drought stress. We identified 2300 targets for the known miRNAs reported in wheat. Pathways analysis of the identified targets showed most of the target genes were involved in signal transduction, transport, organelle localization, DNA methylation, histone modification, chromatin modification, and plant development. A heat map for the top 50 up and downregulated miRNAs were generated. Five novel drought-responsive miRNAs were validated using qRT-PCR for their differential expression patterns. The results of this study significantly expanded the number of the novel as well as drought-responsive miRNAs in wheat which could be useful for further investigation of the biological functions of various genes involved in tolerance to drought stress.
Keywords: wheat, miRNA, miRNA-target, drought, Expression
Received: 22 Feb 2025; Accepted: 21 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Sharma, Mishra, Kaur, Ahlawat and Tiwari. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Pradeep Sharma, Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley Research (ICAR), Karnal, India
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