Sweet Cherry (Prunus avium L.) PaPIP1;4 is a functional aquaporin upregulated by pre-harvest calcium treatments that prevent cracking

The involvement of aquaporins in rain-induced sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) fruit cracking is an important research topic with potential agricultural applications. In the present study, we performed the functional characterization of PaPIP1;4, the most expressed aquaporin in sweet cherry fruit. Field experiments focused on the pre-harvest exogenous application to sweet cherry trees, cultivar Skeena, with a solution of 0.5% CaCl2, which is the most common treatment to prevent cracking. Results show that PaPIP1;4 was mostly expressed in the fruit peduncle, but its steady-state transcript levels were higher in fruits from CaCl2-treated plants than in controls. The transient expression of PaPIP1;4-GFP in tobacco epidermal cells and the overexpression of PaPIP1;4 in YSH1172 yeast mutation showed that PaPIP1;4 is a plasma membrane protein able to transport water and hydrogen peroxide. In this study, we characterized for the first time a plasma membrane sweet cherry aquaporin able to transport water and H2O2 that is upregulated by the pre-harvest exogenous application of CaCl2 supplements.
This work was supported by the “Contrato-Programa” UIDB/04050/2020 and UIDB/04033/2020 funded by national funds through the FCT I.P. The work was also supported by FCT and European Funds (FEDER/POCI/COMPETE2020) through the research projects MitiVineDrought (PTDC/BIA-FBT/30341/2017 and POCI-01-0145-FEDER-030341), BerryPlastid (PTDC/BIA-FBT/28165/2017 and POCI-01-0145-FEDER-028165) and CherryCrackLess (PTDC/AGR-PRO/7028/2014). R.B. was supported with a PhD student grant (PD/BD/113616/2015) under the Agrichains Doctoral Program (PD/00122/2012) funded by FCT. H.N. was supported by an FCT postdoctoral grant (SFRH/BPD/115518/2016) and A.C. was supported by a contract in the MitiVineDrought project.
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion