Coordinated activation of cellulose and repression of lignin biosynthesis pathways in rice

Cellulose from plant biomass is the largest renewable energy resource of carbon fixed from the atmosphere, which can be converted into fermentable sugars for production into ethanol. However, the cellulose present as lignocellulosic biomass is embedded in a hemicellulose and lignin matrix from which it needs to be extracted for efficient processing. Here, we show that expression of an Arabidopsis transcription factor SHINE (SHN) in rice, a model for the grasses, causes a 34% increase in cellulose and a 45% reduction in lignin content. Rice genotypes expressing the Arabidopsis SHN2 gene hereafter called rice AtSHN lines were used in this study. Progenies of three independent AtSHN lines were grown in controlled growth chambers. For all analyses, six plants were used for each of the two transgenic lines and WT. For total RNA isolation, rice leaf tissue of WT and AtSHN lines was used. Samples were hybridized to the rice Affymetrix GeneChip.