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Updated: May 18, 2026
A Simple Method for Isolation of Soybean Protoplasts and Application to Transient Gene Expression Analyses
Published on: January 25, 2018
Highly efficient isolation of Populus mesophyll protoplasts and its application in transient expression assays
Jianjun Guo1, Jennifer L Morrell-Falvey, Jessy L Labbé
1Biosciences Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, United States of America.
Background:
Populus is a model woody plant and a promising feedstock for lignocellulosic biofuel production. However, its lengthy life cycle impedes rapid characterization of gene function.
Methodology/Principal Findings:
We optimized a Populus leaf mesophyll protoplast isolation protocol and established a Populus protoplast transient expression system. We demonstrated that Populus protoplasts are able to respond to hormonal stimuli and that a series of organelle markers are correctly localized in the Populus protoplasts. Furthermore, we showed that the Populus protoplast transient expression system is suitable for studying protein-protein interaction, gene activation, and cellular signaling events.
Conclusions/Significance:
This study established a method for efficient isolation of protoplasts from Populus leaf and demonstrated the efficacy of using Populus protoplast transient expression assays as an in vivo system to characterize genes and pathways.
