IDENTIFICATION OF SOME SALINITY RELATED GENES IN WILD BARLEY

Abstract

This study was carried out during the period 2016- 2021 at the Oil Crops Biotechnology Lab., Agriculture Genetic Engineering Research Institute, Egypt and the Department of Genetics, Faculty of Agriculture, Cairo University, Egypt. In addition, the salinity stress experiment on the wild barley was conducted at the Institute of Ecology, Evolution and Diversity, Frankfurt University, Germany. The present investigation was conducted to address the following objectives: 1- Using the differential display technique to identify genes involved in Egyptian wild barley salinity tolerance traits, coupled with gene expression confirmation via Real-time PCR; 2- Differentiating among the Egyptian barley cultivars in their tolerance to salinity using Real-time PCR and physiological measurements; 3- Confirming the correlation of the identified genes to salinity using Real-time PCR and 4- Cloning the gene that is strongly correlated to salinity tolerance from the wild barley. The results could be summarized as follows: 1. Salinity experiment on the wild barley (H. spontaneum) Egyptian wild barley seeds were germinated on different concentrations of NaCl (0, 25, 50, 75, 100, 125, 150, 175, 200 , 225 and 250 mM NaCl) for 4 weeks. Chlorophyll fluorescence measurements (OJIP, Fv/Fm and PI) were recorded for each treatment. At low concentrations of salt (25, 50 and 75mM NaCl) measurements indicated that stressed barley plants were not negatively affected compared to non-stressed controls. Changes in Chlorophyll fluorescence measurements (OJIP, Fv/Fm and PI) were detected at salt concentrations of 125 till 250 mM NaCl which revealed the stress-negative effects of salt on the photosynthesis machinery.