Bioinformatics analysis of bZIP genes in sugar beet genome and expression profiles under drought - heat stress conditions

The basic leucine zipper (bZIP) transcription factor family is one of the largest and most diverse transcription factor families in plants. In addition to regulating plant growth and development, it plays an important role in the response to biotic and abiotic stresses. Sugar beet (Beta vulgaris L.) taxonomically belongs to Amaranthaceae family and Beta genus. In this study, 251 bZIP genes were identified in the sugar beet genome. When the chromosomal distributions of BvbZIP genes were examined, it was seen that the most genes were located on the 7th chromosome. According to the predicted gene structure analysis, it was determined that 28 BvbZIP genes do not contain introns. When the physical maps were compared with the bZIP genes in Arabidopsis, soybean, rice and poplar plants, it was seen that the plant with the most orthologous genes was soybean and the closest separation time was determined by the genes in the poplar plant. İn addition, phylogenetic relationships, conserved amino acid motifs, gene ontologies, miRNAs targeting bZIP genes, estimated three-dimensional structures for BvbZIP genes were determined using different bioinformatics tools. In addition, the expression profiles of these genes in different conditions were examined using transcriptome data obtained from open databases, and the selected genes were examined by RT-PCR analysis in leaf tissues of drought-tolerant and drought-sensitive sugar beet cultivars. As a result of the analysis, it is thought that BvbZIP-31, BvbZIP-54, BvbZIP-59 and BvbZIP-63 genes play a role in abiotic stress resistance in sugar beet. In additon, expression levels of the BvbZIP-59 gene were significantly increased in both cultivars under all stresses. Thus, although the whole genome sequence of sugar beet was extracted in 2014, for the first time in the sugar beet genome, within the scope of this thesis study, important information was obtained about the determination of bZIP genes, their characterization and investigation of their responses to heat, drought, heat-drought combined stress, and the molecular mechanisms that occur under these stresses. In the light of the information obtained from the bZIP gene family, it is thought that important data will contribute to the production of sugar beet and other agricultural plants that are resistant to heat, drought and combined stress conditions will be obtained. KEYWORDS: Sugar Beet, bZIP, Bioinformatics Analysis, Combined Drought and Heat Stresses, Gene Expression Analysis