Ogneva Z.V., Dubrovina A.S., Kiselev K.V.
В журнале Biologia Plantarum
Год: 2016 Том: 60 Выпуск: 4 Страницы: 628–634
Alterations in DNA methylation levels in mammals are known to play important roles in aging and various diseases, yet their specific contributions await further investigation. Little is known, however, about the contributions of DNA methylation/demethylation to plant aging and senescence. We used Arabidopsis thaliana to study how increasing chronological age of an annual plant species influences the DNA methylation level. Based on methylation-sensitive DNA fragmentation assay, it could be concluded that the chronological aging of A. thaliana was accompanied by DNA demethylation. Bisulfite sequencing revealed that the level of cytosine methylation within the Actin2 3’UTR and ITS1-5.8SrRNA-ITS2 (ITS) DNA regions decreased with A. thaliana growth and ageing. We showed that transcription levels of the methyltransferase genes AtCMT3 and AtMETI significantly decreased during development and ageing of A. thaliana plants, while expression of the demethylase genes AtROS1, AtDME, AtDML2, and AtDML3 increased at least at some stages of plant development. The data obtained in the present study suggest that plant DNA regions may undergo demethylation during plant aging via reduction of DNA methylation processes and activation of active DNA demethylation.
