Possible Involvement of AAAG Motif and PsDof1 in　Elicitor-Induced Gene Expression in Pea

Recently, we, isolated cDNA clone, PsDof1, from clicitor-treated pea cDNA library. The putative gene product, a PsDof1, encodes DNA binding protein that specifically binds the DNA fragment containing AAAG core sequence. In this paper we report that GST-PsDof1 fusion protein specifically binds to the promoter region containing AAAG core sequence(s) of PsCHS1, one of the elicitor-inducible genes encoding chalcone synthase (CHS). Furthermore the addition of DNA fragment containing AAAG motif to the 35S minimal promoter provided the elicitor-responsibility in transient transfection assay using pea protoplasts. These results suggest that PsDof1 might be involved in defense responses by acitivating the transcription by a binding to AAAG core sequence in the promoter of the defense-related genes in pea.