Prediction of Solanum lycopersicum Target of Rapamycin (SlTOR) Protein

Aims: Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is an important protected vegetable in China. Its yield and quality receive much concern, however, its growth is often adversely affected by environmental stress, and so improving stress-resistance of tomato has become an urgent issue to be resolved in facility cultivation. Recent studies find that the TOR(Target of Rapamycin) complex acts as a central coordinator of energy, growth, hormones and stress signals, as well as plays a critical role in regulating transcription, protein synthesis, cell size, cell division, and basal metabolism. To study the mechanism of SlTOR in tomato growth and development as well as in stress responses, we did a series of bioinformatics analysis on SlTOR.

Study Design: In order to explore the mechanism of TOR in regulating tomato resistant to adverse conditions, we systematically analyzed the SlTOR gene with bioinformatics methods, and carried out the determination of its tissue-differential expression, aiming at laying down the basis for further experiment research.

Place and Duration of Study: College of Bioscience and Biotechnology, between March 2018 and April 2019.

Methodology: Bioinformatics analysis was conducted by online programmes. The expression of SlTOR gene in different tissues of tomato was determined by qRT-PCR.

Results: Our results showed that SlTOR was an evolutionarily conserved protein kinase, of which the molecular formula was C12366H19734N3490O3584S104, the relative molecular weight was 277978.19Da and the number of amino acid residues was 2470. Besides, it was predicted to be an acidic and unstable protein. SlTOR protein did not contain the signal peptide or transmembrane region, showing that it might be an intracellular protein. And SlTOR was speculated to be targeted to the chloroplast. Moreover, SlTOR had five domains including HEAT, FAT, PIKKc_TOR, FRB and FATC. The KEGG database displayed the only one SlTOR metabolism pathway related to autophagy. The STRING database found that SlTOR probably interacted with SlSnRK1 and SlPP2C. The experimental results of the expression of SlTOR gene in different tissues suggested that in the mature tomato plant, it was expressed the most highly in the root, followed by in the fruit let and in the mature fruit. Our experimental results were roughly consistent with the predicted results.