Summary
A gene encoding acetolactate synthase was cloned from a chlorsulfuron-resistant mutant of Arabidopsis. The DNA sequence of the mutant gene differed from that of the wild type by a single base pair substitution. When introduced into tobacco by Ti plasmid-mediated transformation the gene conferred a high level of herbicide resistance. These results suggest that the cloned gene may confer agronomically useful levels of herbicide resistnace in other crop species, and that it may be useful as a selectable marker for plant transformation experiments.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
An G, Watson BD, Stachel S, Gordon MP, Nester EW (1985) New cloning vectors for transformation of higher plants. EMBO J 4:277–281
Buchholz WG, Thomashow MF (1984) Comparison of T-DNA oncogene complements of Agrobacterium tumefaciens tumorinducing plasmids with limited and wide host ranges. J Bacteriol 160:319–326
Chaleff RS, Mauvais CJ (1984) Acetolactate synthase is the site of action of two sulfonylurea herbicides in higher plants. Science 224:1443–1445
Chaleff RS, Ray TB (1984) Herbicide-resistant mutants from tobacco cell cultures. Science 223:1148–1151
Comai L, Facciotti D, Hiatt WR, Thompson G, Rose RE, Stalker DM (1985) Expression in plants of a mutant aroA gene from Salmonella typhimurium confers tolerance to glyphosate. Nature 317:741–744
Dhaese P, Degreve H, Decraemer H, Schell J, Van Montagu M (1979) Rapid mapping of transposon insertion and deletion mutations in the large Ti-plasmids of Agrobacterium tumefaciens. Nucleic Acids Res 7:1837–1849
Estelle MA, Somerville CR (1986) The mutants of Arabidopsis. Trends Genet 2:89–93
Frischauf AM, Lehrach H, Poustka A, Murray N (1983) Lambda replacement vectors carrying polylinker sequences. J Mol Biol 170:827–842
Haughn GW, Somerville CR (1986) Sulfonylurea-resistant mutants of Arabidopsis thaliana. Mol Gen Genet 204:430–434
Haughn GW, Somerville CR (1987) Selection for herbicide resistance at the whole-plant level. In: Lebaron HM, Mumma RO, Honeycutt RC, Duesing JH (eds) Biotechnology in Agricultural Chemistry. American Chemical Society, Washington, DC, pp 98–107
Karn J, Matthes HWD, Gait MJ, Brenner S (1984) A new selective phage cloning vector λ2001, with sites for XbaI, BamHI, HindIII, EcoRI, SstI and XhoI. Gene 32:217–224
LaRossa RA, Falco SC (1984) Amino acid biosynthetic enzymes as targets of herbicide action. Trends Biotechnol 2:158–161
LaRossa RA, Schloss JW (1984) The sulfonylurea herbicide sulfometuron methyl is an extremely potent and selective inhibitor of acetolactate synthase in Salmonella typhimurium. J Biol Chem 259:8753–8757
Leutwiler LS, Hough-Evans BR, Meyerowitz EM (1984) The DNA of Arabidopsis. Mol Gen Genet 194:15–23
Maliga P, Breznovits AS, Marton L (1973) Streptomycin-resistant plants from callus cultures of haploid tobacco. Nature New Biol 244:29–30
Maniatis T, Fritsch EF, Sambrook J (1982) Molecular cloning: A laboratory manual. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, New York
Mazur BJ, Chui CF, Smith JK (1987) Isolation and characterization of plant genes coding for acetolactate synthase, the target enzyme for two classes of herbicides. Plant Physiol 85: 1110–1117
Merlo DJ, Nutter RC, Montoya AL, Garfinkl DJ, Drummond MH, Chilton MD, Gordon MP, Nester EW (1980) The boundaries and copy numbers of Ti plasmid T-DNA vary in crown gall tumors. Mol Gen Genet 177:637–643
meyerowitz EM, Pruitt RE (1985) Arabidopsis thaliana and plant molecular genetics. Science 226:1214–1218
Rogers SG, Horsch RB, Fraley RT (1986) Gene transfer in plants: production of transformed plants using Ti plasmid vectors. Methods Enzymol 118:627–640
Sanger F, Nicklen S, Coulson AR (1977) DNA sequencing with chain-terminating inhibitors. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 74:5463–5467
Shah DM, Horsch RB, Klee HJ, Kishore GM, Winter JA, Tumer NE, Hironaka CM, Sanders PR, Gasser CS, Aykent S, Siegel NR, Rogers SG, Fraley RT (1986) Engineering herbicide tolerance in transgenic plants Science 233:478–481
Yadav N, McDevitt RE, Benard S, Falco SC (1986) Single amino acid substitutions in the enzyme acetolactate synthase confer resistance to the herbicide sulfometuron methyl. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 83:4418–4422
Yanisch-Perron C, Vieira J, Messing J (1985) Improved M13 phage cloning vectors and host strains: nucleotide sequences of the M13mp18 and pUC19 vectors. Gene 33:103–119
Zambryski P, Joos H, Genetello C, Leemans J, Van Montagu M, Shell J (1983) Ti plasmid vector for the introduction of DNA into plant cells without alteration of their normal regeneration capacity. EMBO J 2:2143–2150
Zimmerman JL, Goldberg RB (1977) DNA sequence organization in the genome of Nicotiana tabacum. Chromosoma 59:227–252
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
Communicated by G.R. Fink
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Haughn, G.W., Smith, J., Mazur, B. et al. Transformation with a mutant Arabidopsis acetolactate synthase gene renders tobacco resistant to sulfonylurea herbicides. Mol Gen Genet 211, 266–271 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00330603
Received:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00330603