Integrated metabolome and transcriptome analyses provide insight into the effect of red and blue LEDs on the quality of sweet potato leaves

Shehu A Tadda; Chengyue Li; Jintao Ding; Jian'an Li; Jingjing Wang; Huaxing Huang; Quan Fan; Lifang Chen; Pengfei He; John K Ahiakpa; Benjamin Karikari; Xuanyang Chen; Dongliang Qiu

doi:10.3389/fpls.2023.1181680

Integrated metabolome and transcriptome analyses provide insight into the effect of red and blue LEDs on the quality of sweet potato leaves

Front Plant Sci. 2023 May 30:14:1181680. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2023.1181680. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Shehu A Tadda^{1

2

3}, Chengyue Li¹, Jintao Ding¹, Jian'an Li¹, Jingjing Wang¹, Huaxing Huang¹, Quan Fan¹, Lifang Chen¹, Pengfei He¹, John K Ahiakpa³, Benjamin Karikari^{3

4}, Xuanyang Chen^{5

6}, Dongliang Qiu¹

Affiliations

¹ College of Horticulture, Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fuzhou, China.
² Department of Agronomy, Federal University Dutsin-Ma, Katsina, Nigeria.
³ Agriculture Research Group, Organization of African Academic Doctors (OAAD), Nairobi, Kenya.
⁴ Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, University for Development Studies, Tamale, Ghana.
⁵ College of Agriculture, Fujian Agriculture, and Forestry University, Fuzhou, China.
⁶ Key Laboratory of Crop Biotechnology, Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fujian Province Universities, Fuzhou, China.

Abstract

Red and blue light-emitting diodes (LEDs) affect the quality of sweet potato leaves and their nutritional profile. Vines cultivated under blue LEDs had higher soluble protein contents, total phenolic compounds, flavonoids, and total antioxidant activity. Conversely, chlorophyll, soluble sugar, protein, and vitamin C contents were higher in leaves grown under red LEDs. Red and blue light increased the accumulation of 77 and 18 metabolites, respectively. Alpha-linoleic and linolenic acid metabolism were the most significantly enriched pathways based on Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analyses. A total of 615 genes were differentially expressed between sweet potato leaves exposed to red and blue LEDs. Among these, 510 differentially expressed genes were upregulated in leaves grown under blue light compared with those grown under red light, while the remaining 105 genes were expressed at higher levels in the latter than in the former. Among the KEGG enrichment pathways, blue light significantly induced anthocyanin and carotenoid biosynthesis structural genes. This study provides a scientific reference basis for using light to alter metabolites to improve the quality of edible sweet potato leaves.

Keywords: anthocyanin; illumination; leafy vegetable; metabolome profiling; nutrition.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Fujian Provincial Department of Science and Technology, China (Grant numbers: 2020N5013; 2020N003; and 2019N0050); the ‘Social service team’ Support Program Project of FAFU (Grant numbers: 11899170108, and 11899170113).