2026-10-14T17:32:00Z https://www.scidb.cn/oai

10.57760/sciencedb.21934 2025-03-28T11:26:37Z

2025-03-28 Soybean leaf siRNA and bisulfite sequencing doi:10.57760/sciencedb.21934 en In plants, many dominant effects, such as overdominance, incomplete dominance, or codominance, are commonly observed and utilized, but poorly understood. Here, we report an identical phenotype of super-early flowering dominance only in heterozygotes but not in homozygotes in soybean, and reveal the molecular mechanism of this new phenomenon. We found that the homozygous gene triggers siRNA-mediated DNA methylation, causing transcriptional gene silencing, while the heterozygous gene does not. Interestingly, two rounds of DNA methylation establishment occur, each mediated by a distinct mechanism. The 21-22 nucleotide (nt) siRNAs are responsible for initiating DNA methylation in the CHH-context during the initial homozygosity of genes when the mother plants were heterozygous. In contrast, the 24 nt siRNAs play a role in the additional CHG- and CG-context DNA methylation during successive homozygosity of genes when the mother plants were already homozygous. Additionally, generating heterozygous genotype through a crossing experiment with recessive genotype can reduce the DNA methylation level and resume dominant phenotype. Our study provides a new insight into the molecular mechanism of the novel dominant effects and enriches the genetic theory of plants. Flowering time; s iRNA; DNA methylation Xin Xu PUBLIC https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ dataset Science Data Bank