IDENTIFICATION, ISOLATION AND in silico CHARACTERIZATION OF Fragaria vesca HOMOLOGUE OF TEMPRANILLO GENE

The woodland strawberry, Fragaria vesca belongs to the Rosaceae family, one of the most economically important family of fruit tree crops, normally with long juvenility period. Therefore, knowledge about the molecular basis of flowering time regulation and photoperiodic responses in these species is essential for breeding goals. Shortening the juvenility period has been described as an interesting breeding goal for most of the fruit trees, which could be achieved through genetic engineering. TEMPRANILLO (TEM) belongs to the RAV1 (Related to ABI3/VP1) transcription factors family, which is known as a flowering repressor, containing AP2 and a B3 DNA-binding domains. In this study, we identify and isolate F. vesca homologue of Arabidopsis TEM (AtTEM). The full-length cDNA of FvTEM consisting of a coding sequence of 1152 bp, predicted to encode 383 amino acids was obtained, cloned and further analyzed in-silico. Successful cloning was confirmed using colony PCR and sequencing. Bioinformatic analysis showed that the promoter region of FvFT1 contains CAACA and CACCTG motifs which could be recognised as binding sites for FvTEM and directly represses FvFT1 expression. In-silico expression analysis in F. vesca EST database found 21 ESTs with identities more than 50%. Phylogenetic analysis using neighbor joining method revealed that FvTEM is homologous with AtTEM.