ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Bioinformatics
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpls.2025.1615756
This article is part of the Research TopicMulti-omics and Computational Biology in Horticultural Plants: From Genotype to Phenotype, Volume IIIView all 12 articles
Multiomic analysis of the synthetic pathways of secondary metabolites in tobacco leaves at different developmental stages
Provisionally accepted- 1Key Laboratory of Tobacco Biotechnological Breeding, Yunnan Academy of Tobacco Agricultural Sciences, Kunming, China
- 2Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
- 3Institute of Crop Sciences & Institute of Bioinformatics, College of Agriculture and Biotechnology, Hangzhou, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Introduction: Nicotiana tabacum, widely cultivated for its economic and scientific value, produces a broad range of secondary metabolites that play critical roles in determining leaf quality and flavor. Despite substantial progress, the comprehensive regulatory landscape governing secondary metabolite biosynthesis during N. tabacum leaf development remains largely unclear. Methods:To better understand the molecular regulatory mechanisms underlying the biosynthesis of secondary metabolites, particularly flavonoids, during N. tabacum leaf development, we conducted a transcriptomic and non-targeted metabolomic sequencing and analysis at three critical developmental stages: vigorous growth stage (T1), topping stage (T2), and harvest stage (T3). Results: Based on our transcriptomic and metabolomic data, 25 unigenes exhibiting stage-specific expression patterns that were strongly associated with flavonoid accumulation were identified. We found that during early developmental stages (T1-T2), upregulated expression of chalcone synthase (CHS) and chalcone isomerase (CHI) correlated with enhanced flavonoid backbone biosynthesis. In contrast, during the later stage (T3), increased expression of dihydroflavonol 4-reductase (DFR) and anthocyanidin synthase (ANS) was consistent with elevated anthocyanin accumulation. Conclusion: This study systematically analyzed the coordinated regulatory network of flavonoid biosynthesis during leaf development in N. tabacum, revealing dynamic metabolic shifts across developmental stages. The findings offer novel molecular insights into the mechanisms underlying leaf quality formation and establish a theoretical framework for functional studies of candidate genes, reinforcing the utility of N. tabacum as a model species for secondary metabolism research and breeding innovation.
Keywords: Tobacco, multiomic analysis, secondary metabolites, Developmental stages, transcriptomic
Received: 21 Apr 2025; Accepted: 30 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tong, Yang, CHEN, Sui, Huang, Xu, Zhu, Shen, Fan and Xiao. 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:
Kun Yang, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
Bingguang Xiao, Key Laboratory of Tobacco Biotechnological Breeding, Yunnan Academy of Tobacco Agricultural Sciences, Kunming, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.