Reference "The structural organisation of the gene encoding class II starch synthase of wheat and barley and the evolution of the genes encoding starch synthases in plants"

Reference ID

8517

Title

The structural organisation of the gene encoding class II starch synthase of wheat and barley and the evolution of the genes encoding starch synthases in plants

Source

Funct Integr Genomics, 2003, vol. 3, pp. 76-85

Authors (11)

Li-Z	Sun-F	Xu-S	Chu-X
Mukai-Y	Yamamoto-M	Ali-S	Rampling-L
Kosar-Hashemi-B	Rahman-S	Morell-M-K

Abstract

Wheat and barley contain at least four classes of starch synthases in the
endosperm, granule bound starch synthase I (GBSSI) and starch synthases I, II
and III (SSI, SSII, SSIII). In this work, SSII in barley is shown to be
associated with the starch granule by using antibodies. A cDNA from barley
encoding SSII and the genes for SSII from barley and Aegilops tauschii ( A.
tauschii, the D genome donor to wheat) are characterised. Fluorescent in situ
hybridisation (FISH) and PCR were used to localise the wheat SSII gene to the
short arm of chromosome 7, showing synteny with the location of the rice SSII
gene to the short arm of chromosome 6. Comparison of the genes encoding SSII of
A. tauschii, barley and Arabidopsis showed a conserved exon-intron structure
although the size of the introns varied considerably. Extending such comparison
between the genes encoding starch synthases (GBSSI, SSI, SSII and SSIII) from A.
tauschii and Arabidopsis showed that the exon-intron structures are essentially
conserved. Separate and distinct genes for the individual starch synthases
therefore existed before the separation of monocotyledons and dicotyledons.