Sterol Side Chain Reductase 2 Is a Key Enzyme in the Biosynthesis of Cholesterol, the Common Precursor of Toxic Steroidal Glycoalkaloids in Potato[W][OPEN]

This work elucidates the biosynthetic pathway of toxic steroidal glycoalkaloids (SGAs) in potato, revealing that sterol side chain reductase 2 (SSR2) functions as a key enzyme in the biosynthesis of cholesterol and related SGAs. Silencing or disrupting SSR2 yielded potatoes with significantly reduced cholesterol and SGA levels but normal plant growth, making SSR2 an excellent target for breeding. Potatoes (Solanum tuberosum) contain α-solanine and α-chaconine, two well-known toxic steroidal glycoalkaloids (SGAs). Sprouts and green tubers accumulate especially high levels of SGAs. Although SGAs were proposed to be biosynthesized from cholesterol, the biosynthetic pathway for plant cholesterol is poorly understood. Here, we identify sterol side chain reductase 2 (SSR2) from potato as a key enzyme in the biosynthesis of cholesterol and related SGAs. Using in vitro enzyme activity assays, we determined that potato SSR2 (St SSR2) reduces desmosterol and cycloartenol to cholesterol and cycloartanol, respectively. These reduction steps are branch points in the biosynthetic pathways between C-24 alkylsterols and cholesterol in potato. Similar enzymatic results were also obtained from tomato SSR2. St SSR2-silenced potatoes or St SSR2-disrupted potato generated by targeted genome editing had significantly lower levels of cholesterol and SGAs without affecting plant growth. Our results suggest that St SSR2 is a promising target gene for breeding potatoes with low SGA levels.

• Publication year

  2014

• Venue

  The Plant Cell

• Publication date

  2014-09-01

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine, Environmental Science

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1105/tpc.114.130096PMID 25217510PMCID PMC4213163
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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