Molecular Phylogeny and Functional Divergence of Uridine Diphosphate Glycosyltransferases (UGTs) in Crocus Genus and their Homologues in Other Plants

Articles in Press

Document Type : Full Paper

Authors

1 Department of Horticultural sciences,, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Tehran, Karaj, Iran

2 Department of Horticultural sciences, Faulty of Agriculture, University of Tehran, Karaj, Iran

Abstract

ABSTRACT
Crocus sativus L. is considered one of the richest sources of apocarotenoids, including crocin, picrocrocin, and safranal. The oxidative breakdown of carotenoids generates apocarotenoids. Glycosylation is the final step of crocin biosynthesis which is crucial due to its role in pigment solubility in water and changes the chemical properties and bioactivity of the molecule. In this study, the protein sequence of UGTs in saffron and their homologs in other plants were analyzed from different aspects, including phylogeny analysis and motif identification, functional divergence analysis, and structural analysis. The present study focused on UGTs responsible for primary and secondary glycosylation in crocin production and picrocrocin glycosylation in plants where crocin is found. Also, the evolutionary relationship of the UGT protein family in Crocus and other plants was investigated, including type I and type II functional divergence. Phylogeny analysis showed that UGTs that carry out primary glycosylation and UGTs that carry out secondary glycosylation were placed in two groups with the highest functional distance. Motifs were group-specific and amino acids with a high functional divergence coefficient were identified in those motifs, which can be attributed to the functional difference of these sequences. These findings may facilitate future research aimed at characterizing the function of these genes

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Iranian Journal of Horticultural Science

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 13 October 2024

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History

  • Receive Date: 28 November 2023
  • Revise Date: 07 July 2024
  • Accept Date: 08 July 2024

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