Stress tolerance and delayed senescence in plants

Abstract

The novel constructs and methods of this invention improve tolerance in plants to environmental stresses and senescence. Nucleic acids encoding a plant farnesyl transferase are described, as are transgenic plants and seeds incorporating these nucleic acids and proteins. Also provided are inhibitors of naturally-occurring farnesyl transferase which, when expressed, will enhance drought tolerance in the plants, improve resistance to senescence and modify growth habit.

1 . A method of producing a drought-tolerant plant comprising: 
 a) providing a nucleic acid construct comprising a promoter operably-linked to an antisense nucleic acid of a nucleic acid sequence encoding a beta subunit of a farnesyl transferase polypeptide or fragment thereof;    b) inserting said nucleic acid construct into a vector;    c) transforming a plant, tissue culture, or a plant cell with the vector and    d) growing the plant or regenerating a plant from the tissue culture or plant cell;    wherein a drought-tolerant plant is produced.    
   
   
       2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said antisense nucleic acid comprises 467 or more consecutive nucleic acids complementary to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:80 or SEQ ID NO 172.  
   
   
       3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said antisense nucleic acid comprises 200 or more consecutive nucleic acids complementary to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:80 or SEQ ID NO 172.  
   
   
       4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said antisense nucleic acid comprises a nucleic acid sequence complementary to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:80 or SEQ ID NO 172.  
   
   
       5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said nucleic acid construct comprises the nucleic acid sequence of SEQ ID NO: 56 or SEQ ID NO: 57.  
   
   
       6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said promoter is a guard cell specific promoter.  
   
   
       7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said promoter is an era-1 promoter comprising the nucleic acid sequence of SEQ ID NO:3.  
   
   
       8 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said promoter is an inducible promoter.  
   
   
       9 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said promoter is a RD29AP promoter.  
   
   
       10 . A drought tolerant transgenic plant produced by the method of  claim 1 .  
   
   
       11 . A transgenic seed produced by the transgenic plant of  claim 10 , wherein said transgenic seed produces a drought tolerant plant.