ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Breeding
This article is part of the Research TopicBiotechnology Breakthroughs: Engineering Stress-Resilient Crops for Sustainable AgricultureView all articles
Construction long-shelf-life pineapple by deleting abscisic-acid-responsive element in enhancer of 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate synthase gene AcoACS1
Provisionally accepted
- Tropical Crops Genetic Resources Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Danzhou, China
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Introduction: Pineapple fruits were frequently discarded because of softening. Non-climacteric fruit ripening is regulated by abscisic acid. Pineapple is a non-climacteric fruit. Ethylene participates in pineapple ripening. However, whether abscisic acid regulates pineapple ripening and the relationship between abscisic acid and ethylene in pineapple fruit have not been reported. Methods: Pineapple mutant lines were generated using the Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR)/CRISPR-associated protein 9 (Cas9). The ethylene content, abscisic acid content, respiration rate, fruit firmness, aroma profiles, and the acticities of polygalacturonase, pectin methylesterase, β-galactosidase, xylanase, cellulase in pineapple flesh were measured. Quantitative Real-Time Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction was performed to analyze the expression of the 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate synthase gene AcoACS1 across different pineapple lines. Results and discussion: Both abscisic acid and ethylene can induce pineapple ripening and softening. Ethylene content in pineapple fruits can be stimulated by abscisic acid. An abscisic-acid-responsive element in the enhancer sequence of the 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid synthase gene AcoACS1 was identified. After this element was knocked out, the expression of AcoACS1 was not induced by abscisic acid treatment, and the onset of pineapple softening was delayed. Aroma compound contents in the mutant fruit and Tainong 17 were similar. Abscisic acid induces pineapple ripening via the abscisic-acid-responsive element in AcoACS1. Pineapples with a long shelf-life can be generated through knocking out this element in AcoACS1.
Keywords: 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid synthase gene AcoACS1, abscisic-acid-responsive element, Aroma substance, fruit firmness, hydrolase activity
Received: 17 Dec 2025; Accepted: 27 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Chang, Shu, Luan, Wang, He, Wei and Zhan. 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: Shenghe Chang
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