Proteomic response of tea plants stimulated by ammonium supply

Ammonium (NH₄⁺) is a major nitrogen source for tea plant growth. Although NH₄⁺-induced growth of tea plants were reported, it was still unclear to elucidate the mechanism of proteins in tea plants in responding to NH₄⁺ resupply. In the present study, the proteomic profiles of tea leaves under N deficiency/resupply were investigated by using LC-MS/MS and PRM technique. Compared with N deficiency, there were 247 and 328 proteins significantly expressed after 3 h and 3d of N resupplied, respectively. And compared with 3 h of N resupplied, there were 186 proteins significantly expressed after 3d of N resupplied. According to bioinformatics analysis, the results showed that different expressed proteins participated in various biological processes, such as PsbO, Pbs27, PsaN, and PsaF were involved in photosynthesis, ADH1, AOC3, URE, GDH1-2, and argD were involved in amino acid metabolism, CHI and ANR were involved in flavonoid biosynthesis, GSTF9, APX, and GSS were involved in glutathione metabolism, and PdxT and PdxS were involved in vitamin B6 metabolism. Through PPI analysis, the results showed that the interactions between different expressed proteins mainly occurred in the photosynthetic pathway. Ammonium supply has a profound impact on photosynthesis, amino acid metabolism, flavonoid biosynthesis, glutathione metabolism, and vitamin B6 metabolism.