Temperature-sensitive Arabidopsis mutant defective in 1-deoxy-D-xylulose 5-phosphate synthase within the plastid non-mevalonate pathway of isoprenoidbiosynthesis
N. Araki et al., Temperature-sensitive Arabidopsis mutant defective in 1-deoxy-D-xylulose 5-phosphate synthase within the plastid non-mevalonate pathway of isoprenoidbiosynthesis, PHYSL PLANT, 108(1), 2000, pp. 19-24
The temperature-sensitive mutant of Arabidopsis, chs5, developed chlorotic
leaves at restrictive temperatures (15 degrees C), but almost normal green
leaves at permissive temperatures (22 degrees C). At the restrictive temper
ature, the chs5 mutation blocked the accumulation of chlorophylls and carot
enoids. A temperature-shift analysis revealed that the manifestation of the
chlorotic phenotype occurred in young leaf tissues, but did not in mature
leaf tissues. Genetic and sequence analysis demonstrated that the chs5 muta
tion was caused by a single-base change in the coding region of a recently
identified CLA1 gene. The CLA1 gene exhibited a high sequence similarity to
the genes encoding I-deoxy-D-xylulose 5-phosphate synthase (DXS) localized
to the non-mevalonate pathway, which was recently discovered in bacteria a
nd higher plants. In addition, the application of 1-deoxy-D-xylulose, the f
ree sugar of I-deoxy-D-xylulose 5-phosphate, rescues the defect in the chs5
mutant. These results indicated that the chlorotic phenotype of the chs5 m
utant was caused by a defect in DXS activity and that DXS functions prefere
ntially at an early stage of leaf cell development. A transiently expressed
green fluorescent protein fused with the CLA1 transit peptide was localize
d within the chloroplasts in the green cultured cells of tobacco, which sug
gests that the putative localization of the non-mevalonate pathway is in pl
astids.