Study On Transformation Of Rice For Curcin Gene Of Jatropha Curcas

Jatropha curcas L. is a member of the family Euphorbiaceae. The seeds of the Jatropha curcas represent an abundant source of proteins. It was verified that a toxic protein (curcin), which was isolated and purified from J. curcas seeds, is a ribosome-inactivating protein (RIP). As a type of plant antifungal proteins, curcin could obviously inhibit hyphal growth and spore formation of many plant pathogenic fungi.Rice is one of the most important crops, but fungi diseases affect its yield and attribute seriously every year. Therefore, an approach using plant genetic engineering for enhancing antifungal properties of rice by introducing the curcin gene into rice will be possible.In this study, the plant expression vector with curcin gene was constructed, and then transferred into rice mediated by Agrobacterium tumefaciens. On the other hand, some factors in rice transformation system were optimized. Using this system, transgenic rice plants were obtained. It could be the base of the further study on the function of curcin gene, and might provide an efficient way for promoting plant diseases resistant ability. The main results were summarized as follows:1. PCR primers were designed based on the cDNA sequence of curcin. An open reading frame (ORF) encoding mature of protein of curcin was cloned from total DNA of J. curcas, which lay the basis for the next study on the construction of plant...