An update on the maize zein-gene family in the post-genomics era  

作　　者：Nasr Ullah Khan Mohamed Sheteiwy Ning Lihua Muhammad Mohib Ullah Khan Zhao Han 

机构地区：[1]Institute of Crop Germplasm and Biotechnology,Provincial Key Laboratory of Agrobiology,Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences,Nanjing 210014,China [2]Department of Agronomy,Faculty of Agriculture,Mansoura University,Mansoura,Egypt [3]Faculty of Agriculture,Gomal University,Dera Ismail Khan,KP,Pakistan

出　　处：《Food Production, Processing and Nutrition》2019年第1期11-22,共12页食物生产加工与营养（英文）

基　　金：supported by Key Research and Development Program of Jiangsu Province(BE2017365)。

摘　　要：Maize(Zea mays)is a cereal crop of global food importance.However,the deficiency of essential amino acids,more importantly lysine,methionine and tryptophan,in the major seed storage zein proteins makes corn nutritionally of low value for human consumption.The idea of improving maize nutritional value prompted the search for maize natural mutants harboring low zein contents and higher amount of lysine.These studies resulted in the identification of more than dozens of maize opaque mutants in the previous few decades,o2 mutant being the most extensively studied one.However,the high lysine contents but soft kernel texture and chalky endosperm halted the widespread application and commercial success of maize opaque mutants,which ultimately paved the way for the development of Quality Protein Maize(QPM)by modifying the soft endosperm of o2 mutant into lysine-rich hard endosperm.The previous few decades have witnessed a marked progress in maize zein research.It includes elucidation of molecular mechanism underlying the role of different zein genes in seed endosperm development by cloning different components of zein family,exploring the general organization,function and evolution of zein family members within maize species and among other cereals,and elucidating the cis-and trans-regulatory elements modulating the regulation of different molecular players of maize seed endosperm development.The current advances in high quality reference genomes of maize lines B73 and Mo17 plus the completion of ongoing pan genome sequencing projects of more maize lines with NGS technologies are expected to revolutionize maize zein gene research in near future.This review highlights the recent advances in QPM development and its practical application in the post genomic era,genomic and physical composition and evolution of zein family,and expression,regulation and downstream role of zein genes in endosperm development.Moreover,recent genomic tools and methods developed for functional validation of maize zein genes are also discussed.

关 键 词：ZEIN Opaque mutants QPM NGS 

分 类 号：S51[农业科学—作物学]