Mutational reconstructed ferric chelate reductase confers enhanced tolerance in rice to iron deficiency in calcareous soil

Ishimaru, Yasuhiro*; Kim, S.*; Tsukamoto, Takashi*; Oki, Hiroyuki*; Kobayashi, Takanori*; Watanabe, Satoshi; Matsuhashi, Shimpei; Takahashi, Michiko*; Nakanishi, Hiromi*; Mori, Satoshi*; Nishizawa, Naoko*

Fe deficiency is a worldwide agricultural problem on calcareous soils. Rice plants use a well documented phytosiderophore-based system to take up Fe from the soil. Rice plants are extremely susceptible to low-Fe supply, however, because of low phytosiderophore secretion and low Fe reduction activity. A yeast Fe chelate-reductase gene , selected for better performance at high pH, was fused to the promoter of the Fe-regulated transporter, , and introduced into rice plants. The transgene was expressed in response to a low-Fe nutritional status in roots of transformants. Transgenic rice plants expressing the gene showed higher Fe chelate-reductase activity and a higher Fe-uptake rate than vector controls under Fe-deficient conditions. Consequently, transgenic rice plants exhibited an enhanced tolerance to low-Fe availability and 7.9x the grain yield of nontransformed plants in calcareous soils.