LcBiP, a endoplasmic reticulum chaperone binding protein gene from Lycium chinense, confers cadmium tolerance in transgenic tobacco.

Cadmium (Cd) accumulation is very toxic to plants. The presence of Cd may lead to excessive production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and then cause inhibition of plant growth. The endoplasmic reticulum chaperone binding protein (BiP) is an important functional protein, which has been shown to function as a sensor of alterations in the ER environment. BiP overexpression in plants was shown to increase drought tolerance through inhibition of ROS accumulation. Due to the above relationships, it is likely that there may be a link between Cd stress tolerance, ROS accumulation and the BiP transcript expression in plants. In this study, a BiP gene, LcBiP, from L. chinense was isolated and characterized. Overexpression of LcBiP in tobacco conferred Cd tolerance. Under Cd stress conditions, the transgenic tobacco lines exhibited better chlorophyll retention, less accumulation of ROS, longer root length, more glutathione (GSH) content, and less antioxidant enzyme activity than the wild type. These data demonstrated that LcBiP act as a positive regulator in Cd stress tolerance. It is hypothesized that the improved Cd tolerance of the transgenic tobacco plants may be due to the enhanced ROS scavenging capacity. The enhancement of GSH content might contribute to this ROS scavenging capacity in the transgenic plants. However, the underlying mechanism for BiP-mediated increase in Cd stress tolerance need to be further clarified.