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Agronomy
Special Issues
Horticultural Crop Secondary Metabolism
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Horticultural Crop Secondary Metabolism

A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395). This special issue belongs to the section "Plant-Crop Biology and Biochemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 April 2024) | Viewed by 2948

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Marco Pietrella

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA), Research Centre for Olive, Citrus and Tree Fruit, 47121 Forlì, Italy
Interests: carotenoids; flavonolignans; secondary metabolites; anthocyanins; genomic; breeding
Dr. Alessandro Nicolia

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA), Research Centre for Vegetable and Ornamental Crops (CREA-OF), Pontecagnano, Italy
Interests: stress tolerance; carotenoids; strigolactones

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Plants produce thousands of low-molecular-weight organic compounds for every aspect of their life. Among those, secondary metabolites are products not directly involved in the development, normal growth, and reproduction of the producing plants, but are essential for their interactions with the surrounding environment. Responding to biotic or abiotic stimuli, working as pollinator attractants or biological defences, either widespread or species-/ tissue-specific, those compounds exert their role in many different ambits and have multiple functions. Since ancient times, humans have used them as agrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, food additives and aromatics.

Different classes of secondary metabolites exist according to their structures, and such chemical diversity corresponds to different biological roles. Plants reserve energy and exhibit finely tuned biosynthetic and regulative pathways for their synthesis. The characterization of such compounds and the elucidation of their biosynthetic pathways and related regulation networks would be of key importance to manipulate and drive the production and the accumulation of such metabolites using genetic engineering as well as more conventional breeding approaches to produce biofortified crops, as well as boosting plant molecular farming strategies.

This Special Issue of Agronomy therefore welcomes original research articles as well as reviews focusing on the characterization of secondary metabolites, their ecological roles including the interactions of the plants with the environment and their regulation, as well as strategies for bioaccumulation.

Dr. Marco Pietrella
Dr. Alessandro Nicolia
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agronomy is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • secondary metabolites
  • bioactive compounds
  • natural products
  • isoprenoids
  • alkaloids
  • flavonoids
  • poliketides
  • phenylpropanoids
  • biofortification
  • metabolism
  • abiotic and biotic stress
  • transcription factors

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 3066 KiB  
Article
Metabolomic and Transcriptomic Insights into Anthocyanin Biosynthesis in ‘Ziyan’ Tea Plants under Varied Photoperiod and Temperature Conditions
by Chunjing Yang, Wei Chen, Dandan Tang, Xiaoqin Tan, Liqiang Tan and Qian Tang
Agronomy 2024, 14(1), 56; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14010056 - 25 Dec 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 982
Abstract
(1) Background: Anthocyanins, the main pigments in plants, are influenced by both temperature and photoperiod. However, the specific mechanisms underlying anthocyanin accumulation in tea plants in response to these two environmental factors remain unclear. (2) Methods: This study subjected potted ‘Ziyan’ tea plants [...] Read more.
(1) Background: Anthocyanins, the main pigments in plants, are influenced by both temperature and photoperiod. However, the specific mechanisms underlying anthocyanin accumulation in tea plants in response to these two environmental factors remain unclear. (2) Methods: This study subjected potted ‘Ziyan’ tea plants to four types of day-length and temperature treatments (HL (28 °C, 16 h), HS (28 °C, 8 h), LL (18 °C, 16 h), and LS (18 °C, 8 h)), and then conducted targeted metabolomic and transcriptomic analyses of the samples. (3) Results: Long photoperiods and low temperatures both promoted anthocyanin accumulation in the new shoots of the tea plants. Furthermore, the enhancing effects of these two environmental factors on anthocyanin accumulation are additive and exhibit interactive effects. Through a combined analysis of metabolomics and transcriptomics, five key differentially accumulated metabolites (DAMs) and twenty-two key differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified, the latter being found to participate in the regulation of anthocyanin biosynthesis pathways under varying light and temperature conditions. In summary, extended photoperiods primarily increase the content levels of ten metabolites, including cyanidin and naringenin-7-O-glucoside, by upregulating CHS, F3H, and ANS genes. In contrast, low temperatures primarily enhance the synthesis of seven anthocyanins, including cyanidin and cyanidin-3-O-rutinoside, by upregulating the ANS and UFGT genes. (4) Conclusions: Collectively, the differences in the expression levels of CHS, F3H, ANS, and UFGT might be responsible for ‘Ziyan’ tea plants’ purple shoot coloration, providing important data towards the discovery of candidate genes and molecular bases controlling the purple leaves of these tea plants under varied photoperiods and temperatures. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Horticultural Crop Secondary Metabolism)
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17 pages, 3726 KiB  
Article
Transcriptomic and Metabolic Analyses Elucidate the Metabolomic Variation in Leaf Development of a Calcium-Rich Vegetable (Primulina eburnea)
by Yi Zhang, Endian Yang, Qin Liu and Chen Feng
Agronomy 2023, 13(8), 2157; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy13082157 - 17 Aug 2023
Viewed by 1347
Abstract
Primulina eburnea, a plant with a longstanding history of traditional medicinal use, has emerged as a novel calcium-rich vegetable characterized by a remarkable abundance of soluble and bioavailable calcium within its leaves. However, most of the metabolites produced by P. eburnea have [...] Read more.
Primulina eburnea, a plant with a longstanding history of traditional medicinal use, has emerged as a novel calcium-rich vegetable characterized by a remarkable abundance of soluble and bioavailable calcium within its leaves. However, most of the metabolites produced by P. eburnea have not been identified, and few studies have addressed the accumulation of nutritional and medicinal ingredients during leaf development. In the present study, we investigated the “Gaogai-1” cultivar by integrating transcriptomic and mestabolomic methods. A total of 1041 metabolites were identified in calcium-rich vegetable leaves. During leaf development, most of the flavor components, including amino acids and derivatives, organic acids and derivatives, and carbohydrates, decreased their content, which contrasted with the starch content. Most of the antioxidant components, e.g., flavonoids, alkaloids, vitamins, and phenolamines, were more highly accumulated in the bud leaves than in the mature leaves, but terpenes had the opposite trend. These results indicate that leaves of different developmental stages are suitable for different medicinal uses and that P. eburnea could be regarded as a new type of medicinal and edible vegetable. Furthermore, most of the coding genes related to the important components that influence the flavor and nutritional and medicinal values were identified, and their expressions were consistent with the component accumulation profiles. Transcription factors that may regulate the coding genes were identified by combining the co-expression network and cis-element binding ability prediction. The high level of water-soluble calcium was maintained by the high expression of Ca2+/cation antiporter genes in calcium-rich vegetable leaves. Our results uncovered metabolomic and molecular evidence of the mechanisms of nutritional and medicinal component accumulation underlying the leaf development of a calcium-rich vegetable. This study provides a wealth of data for the future utilization and improvement of calcium-rich vegetable cultivars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Horticultural Crop Secondary Metabolism)
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