Browsing by Author "Nilo-Poyanco, Ricardo"

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    Phylogenetically diverse wild plant species use common biochemical strategies to thrive in the Atacama Desert
    (2024) Dussarrat, Thomas; Nilo-Poyanco, Ricardo; Moyano Yugovic, Tomas Custodio; Prigent, Sylvain; Jeffers, Tim L.; Diaz, Francisca P.; Decros, Guillaume; Audi, Lauren; Sondervan, Veronica M.; Shen, Bingran; Araus, Viviana; Rolin, Dominique; Shasha, Dennis; Coruzzi, Gloria M.; Gibon, Yves; Latorre H., Claudio; Petriacq, Pierre; Gutierrez Alliende, Rodrigo Hernán
    The best ideotypes are under mounting pressure due to increased aridity. Understanding the conserved molecular mechanisms that evolve in wild plants adapted to harsh environments is crucial in developing new strategies for agriculture. Yet our knowledge of such mechanisms in wild species is scant. We performed metabolic pathway reconstruction using transcriptome information from 32 Atacama and phylogenetically related species that do not live in Atacama (Sisters species). We analyzed reaction enrichment to understand the commonalities and differences of Atacama plants. To gain insights into the mechanisms that ensure survival, we compared expressed gene isoform numbers and gene expression patterns between the annotated biochemical reactions from 32 Atacama and Sister species. We found biochemical convergences characterized by reactions enriched in at least 50% of the Atacama species, pointing to potential advantages against drought and nitrogen starvation, for instance. These findings suggest that the adaptation in the Atacama Desert may result in part from shared genetic legacies governing the expression of key metabolic pathways to face harsh conditions. Enriched reactions corresponded to ubiquitous compounds common to extreme and agronomic species and were congruent with our previous metabolomic analyses. Convergent adaptive traits offer promising candidates for improving abiotic stress resilience in crop species.
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    Plant ecological genomics at the limits of life in the Atacama Desert
    (2021) Eshel, Gil; Araus, Viviana; Undurraga, Soledad; Soto, Daniela C.; Moraga, Carol; Montecinos, Alejandro; Moyano, Tomas; Maldonado, Jonathan; Diaz, Francisca P.; Varala, Kranthi; Nelson, Chase W.; Contreras-Lopez, Orlando; Pal-Gabor, Henrietta; Kraiser, Tatiana; Carrasco-Puga, Gabriela; Nilo-Poyanco, Ricardo; Zegar, Charles M.; Orellana, Ariel; Montecino, Martin; Maass, Alejandro; Allende, Miguel L.; DeSalle, Robert; Stevenson, Dennis W.; Gonzalez, Mauricio; Latorre, Claudio; Coruzzi, Gloria M.; Gutierrez, Rodrigo A.
    The Atacama Desert in Chile-hyperarid and with high-ultraviolet irradiance levels-is one of the harshest environments on Earth. Yet, dozens of species grow there, including Atacama-endemic plants. Herein, we establish the Talabre-Leji = a transect (TLT) in the Atacama as an unparalleled natural laboratory to study plant adaptation to extreme environmental conditions. We characterized climate, soil, plant, and soil-microbe diversity at 22 sites (every 100 m of altitude) along the TLT over a 10-y period. We quantified drought, nutrient deficiencies, large diurnal temperature oscillations, and pH gradients that define three distinct vegetational belts along the altitudinal cline. We deep-sequenced transcriptomes of 32 dominant plant species spanning the major plant clades, and assessed soil microbes by metabarcoding sequencing. The top-expressed genes in the 32 Atacama species are enriched in stress responses, metabolism, and energy production. Moreover, their root-associated soils are enriched in growthpromoting bacteria, including nitrogen fixers. To identify genes associated with plant adaptation to harsh environments, we compared 32 Atacama species with the 32 closest sequenced species, comprising 70 taxa and 1,686,950 proteins. To perform phylogenomic reconstruction, we concatenated 15,972 ortholog groups into a supermatrix of 8,599,764 amino acids. Using two codonbased methods, we identified 265 candidate positively selected genes (PSGs) in the Atacama plants, 64% of which are located in Pfam domains, supporting their functional relevance. For 59/184 PSGs with an Arabidopsis ortholog, we uncovered functional evidence linking them to plant resilience. As some Atacama plants are closely related to staple crops, these candidate PSGs are a "genetic goldmine" to engineer crop resilience to face climate change.