Functional Characterization of the Gene Under Drought Stress

With persistent elevation in global temperature, water scarcity becomes a major threat to plant growth and development, yield security, agricultural sustainability, and food production. Proline, as a key osmolyte and antioxidant, plays a critical role in regulating drought tolerance in plants, especially its key biosynthetic enzyme, delta-1-pyrroline-5-carboxylate synthase (P5CS), which always positively responds to drought stress. As an important woody oil crop, the expansion of cultivation needs to address the issue of plant drought tolerance. Here, we isolated a gene from , with an open reading frame of 1842 bp encoding 613 amino acids. expression progressively increased in response to increasing drought stress, and it was localized in the cytoplasm. Silencing of in reduced drought tolerance, accompanied by decreased proline content, elevated reactive oxygen species (ROS) accumulation, and increased relative electrical conductivity (REC) and malondialdehyde (MDA) levels. Conversely, overexpression of in plants enhanced drought resistance, manifested by increased proline levels, reduced ROS accumulation, and lower REC and MDA contents. This study isolates from and validates its role in regulating drought tolerance, providing valuable genetic resources and theoretical insights for the development of drought-resistant cultivars.