Abscisic acid (ABA) affects many important plant processes, such as seed germination, root elongation and stomatal movement. However, little information is available about the relationship between ABA and sugar synthesis during adventitious root formation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of ABA on adventitious root formation in cucumber and whether the effect of this plant hormone on sugar synthesis could be included as a causative factor for adventitious root development. We determined the contents of glucose, sucrose, starch, total sugar and sugar-related enzymes, including sucrose synthase (SS), sucrose phosphate synthase (SPS), hexokinase (HK) and pyruvate kinase (PK) activities in ABA treatment. We also quantified the relative expression of sucrose or glucose synthesis genes during this process. Increasing ABA concentrations significantly improved adventitious root formation, with the most considerable effect at 0.05 μM. Compared to the control, ABA treatment showed higher glucose, sucrose, starch and total sugar contents. Moreover, ABA treatment increased glucose-6-phosphate (G6P), fructose-6-phosphate (F6P) and glucose-1-phosphate (G1P) contents in cucumber explants during adventitious root development, which was followed by an increase of activities of sucrose-related enzymes SS and SPS, glucose-related enzymes HK and PK. ABA, meanwhile, upregulated the expression levels of sucrose or glucose synthesis-related genes, including CsSuSy1, CsSuSy6, CsHK1 and CsHK3. These results suggest that ABA may promote adventitious root development by increasing the contents of glucose, sucrose, starch, total sugar, G6P, F6P and G1P, the activities of SS, SPS, HK, SPS and the expression levels of CsSuSy1, CsSuSy6, CsHK1 and CsHK3 genes. These findings provide evidence for the physiological role of ABA during adventitious root formation and provide a new understanding of the possible relationship between ABA and sugar synthesis during adventitious rooting in plants.
Keywords: abscisic acid; adventitious root formation; cucumber; sugar synthesis.