The plant Rboh gene family has been comprehensively analyzed in several model organisms as Arabidopsis, rice, wheat, Glycine max, Brassica rapa and multiple trees (Groom et al. 1996; Kimura et al. 2020; Lin et al. 2009; Torres and Dangl 2005; Wong et al. 2007). Many studies indicated that RBOH are vital regulators of many key cellular processes including vegetative and reproductive development, stomatal movement, and responses to hormones and diverse environmental stimuli in plant (Wang et al. 2020b). However, the constituent and function of Rbohs were poorly understand in red algae, as few studies were carried out (Hervé et al. 2006; Shim et al. 2022). Recently, according to our study on genome-wide identification of Rboh genes, there are 11, 10, 8, 6, 2 and 4 members in N. yezoensis, N. haitanensis, Porphyra umbilicalis, Gracilariopsis chorda, Cyanidioschyzon merolae and Chondrus crispus, respectively (Gui et al. 2022). It is interesting that species belonging to Bangiales have more Rboh genes, suggesting these genes may be required to adapt the intertidal stress conditions. In the present study, 10 putative Rboh genes in N. haitanensis were identified and characterized.
The estimated divergence time of N. yezoensis and N. haitanensis was about 100 million years ago (Chen et al. 2022; Wang et al. 2020a), indicating long evolutionary history shape the genomic structure of two species. Nevertheless, when comparing the gene synteny in two species, long syntenic regions were identified as relatively conserved relationships (Fig. 1), probably due to their similar ecological niche in evolution. In terms of Rboh genes, we identified 9 orthologous pairs thorough phylogenetic analysis, 6 of which has been verified as in collinear regions. These results indicated the generally evolutionary dynamics of Rboh genes, and the conserved Rbohs may participate the common processes in adapting to the complex intertidal environment and regulating their own growth and development. On the other hand, there were two and one species-specific Rbohs in N. yezoensis and N. haitanensis, respectively. These genes may be related with the unique species-specific features in two species. For example, the gametophytic blades of N. yezoensis could proceed asexual reproduction via arecheospores, but P. haitanensis doesn’t possess this characteristic. And our study has confirmed the involvement of two N. yezoensis-specific Rbohs in archeospore formation, whereas the function of N. haitanensis-specific Rboh still need explore.
In this study, we found the up-stream regions of NhRboh genes contain several response elements related to abiotic stress, such as light, drought, salt, and low temperature response elements, suggesting these genes could be regulated by transcription factors related to these stress processes (Fig. 2). Also, the ABA response elements were included in several genes. As important plant hormone related to plant stress response signaling pathway (Danquah et al. 2014; Yoshida et al. 2014), the participating of NhRboh genes in the related signaling networks is worthy of investigating. Besides, based on the expression analysis, some NhRboh genes were significantly up-regulated under solo or combination stress conditions, for example, the expression of NhRbohE was specifically expressed under heat stress, indicating some genes may be involved in the process of stress tolerance in N. haitanensis.
Theoretically, the genes belonging to same gene family were originated through gene duplication, which is one of the most important mechanisms for evolutionary novelties (Ganko et al. 2007). The divergence of expression patterns following duplication events has drawn great attention in recent studies (Li et al. 2009). Among different NhRboh genes, highly divergence in cis-acting elements of the up-stream regions, and highly divergent expression profiles based on qRT-PCR and omics analysis (Figs. 3 and 4), were observed. Thus, the subfunctionalization model for duplicate gene could explain the profiles of expression divergence between genes (Lynch et al. 2001), in which the distinct physiological functions of these Rboh genes are likely to have arisen through subfunctionalization based on the specialized expression patterns.
In conclusion, 10 putative NhRboh genes were identified from the genome of Neoporphyra haitanensis, 6 of which were in the conserved syntenic regions. Expression analysis indicated that 8 NhRboh genes were divergently expressed under stress conditions of dehydration, heat stress and co-stresses of heat and dehydration, which also suggest some genes may be involved in the process of stress tolerance in N. haitanensis. This study provides valuable information direction and theoretical support for further research on Rboh genes in N. haitanensis.