Expression of an engineered tandem-repeat starch-binding domain in sweet potato plants

Abstract

In this study, the transgenic sweet potato Xu55-2 modified with an engineered tandem repeat of a family 20 starch binding domain (SBD2) was analyzed by Western dot blot to investigate whether SBD2 proteins are capable of granule-targeting during starch biosynthesis. Furthermore, the impact of SBD2 accumulation in granules on the physicochemical properties of the transgenic starches was also investigated. Our results demonstrate that the high levels of SBD2 protein could be accumulated in granules. The SBD2 expression affect granule morphology without altering the primary structure of the constituent starch molecules, suggesting that SBD2 could be used as an anchor for effector proteins to sweet potato starch granules during biosynthesis.

Keywords: Sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas), tandem starch-binding domain, transgenic starch, granule morphology.

African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(41), pp. 5994-5999