Abstract
We reported previously that plants grown in the air containing nitrogen dioxide (NO2) at the environmental standard concentration were almost two times greater in growth rate and biomass yield than those grown in the air without NO2 (designated plant vitalization)1). Based on the DNA microarray analysis, we obtained about 30 key candidate genes responsible for the plant vitalization in Arabidopsis thaliana. In this study, we investigated the responses of T-DNA insertion mutants defective in these genes to NO2. One-week-old seedlings of mutants were cultivated for 3 weeks in the air containing or not containing 50 pbb NO2, after which the biomass of plants were determined. We found that a line (designated vita1) lacked the response to NO2. We made 35S:VITA1 and amiR-VITA1 constructs, produced transformant plants bearing each one of the constructs, and are currently analyzing them.
1) M. Takahashi et al. (2005) New Phytologist 168: 149-154.
