Integrative Transcriptomic and Metabolic Analyses Reveal That Flavonoid Biosynthesis Is the Key Pathway Regulating Pigment Deposition in Naturally Brown Cotton Fibers

作者：Shandang Shi, Rui Tang, Xiaoyun Hao, Shouwu Tang, Wengang Chen, Chao Jiang, Mengqian Long, Kailu Chen, Xiangxiang Hu, Quanliang Xie, Shuangquan Xie, Zhuang Meng, Asigul Ismayil, Xiang Jin, Fei Wang, Haifeng Liu, Hongbin Li · 发表于：Plants · 年份：2024 · DOI：10.3390/plants13152028 · 被引用次数：6 · 研究领域：Research in Cotton Cultivation、Plant Gene Expression Analysis、Dyeing and Modifying Textile Fibers

Brown cotton is a major cultivar of naturally colored cotton, and brown cotton fibers (BCFs) are widely utilized as raw materials for textile industry production due to their advantages of being green and dyeing-pollution-free. However, the mechanisms underlying the pigmentation in fibers are still poorly understood, which significantly limits their extensive applications in related fields. In this study, we conducted a multidimensional comparative analysis of the transcriptomes and metabolomes between brown and white fibers at different developmental periods to identify the key genes and pathways regulating the pigment deposition. The transcriptomic results indicated that the pathways of flavonoid biosynthesis and phenylpropanoid biosynthesis were significantly enriched regulatory pathways, especially in the late development periods of fiber pigmentation; furthermore, the genes distributed in the pathways of PAL, CHS, F3H, DFR, ANR, and UFGT were identified as significantly up-regulated genes. The metabolic results showed that six metabolites, namely (−)-Epigallocatechin, Apiin, Cyanidin-3-O-glucoside, Gallocatechin, Myricetin, and Poncirin, were significantly accumulated in brown fibers but not in white fibers. Integrative analysis of the transcriptomic and metabolomic data demonstrated a possible regulatory network potentially regulating the pigment deposition, in which three MYB transcription factors promote the expression levels of flavonoid biosynthesis genes, thereby i...