Genome-wide analysis of ATP-binding cassette transporter provides insight to genes related to bioactive metabolite transportation in Salvia miltiorrhiza

BACKGROUND: ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporters have been found to play important roles in metabolic transport in plant cells, influencing subcellular compartmentalisation and tissue distribution of these metabolic compounds. Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge, known as Danshen in traditional Chinese medicine, is a highly valued medicinal plant used to treat cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. The dry roots and rhizomes of S. miltiorrhiza contain biologically active secondary metabolites of tanshinone and salvianolic acid. Given an assembled and annotated genome and a set of transcriptome data of S. miltiorrhiza, we analysed and identified the candidate genes that likely involved in the bioactive metabolite transportation of this medicinal plant, starting with the members of the ABC transporter family. RESULTS: A total of 114 genes encoding ABC transporters were identified in the genome of S. miltiorrhiza. All of these ABC genes were divided into eight subfamilies: 3ABCA, 31ABCB, 14ABCC, 2ABCD, 1ABCE, 7ABCF, 46ABCG, and 10 ABCI. Gene expression analysis revealed tissue-specific expression profiles of these ABC transporters. In particular, we found 18 highly expressed transporters in the roots of S. miltiorrhiza, which might be involved in transporting the bioactive compounds of this medicinal plant. We further investigated the co-expression profiling of these 18 genes with key enzyme genes involved in tanshinone and salvianolic acid biosynthetic pathways using quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). From this RT-qPCR validation, we found that three ABC genes (SmABCG46, SmABCG40, and SmABCG4) and another gene (SmABCC1) co-expressed with the key biosynthetic enzymes of these two compounds, respectively, and thus might be involved in tanshinone and salvianolic acid transport in root cells. In addition, we predicted the biological functions of S. miltiorrhiza ABC transporters using phylogenetic relationships and analysis of the transcriptome to find biological functions. CONCLUSIONS: Here, we present the first systematic analysis of ABC transporters in S. miltiorrhiza and predict candidate transporters involved in bioactive compound transportation in this important medicinal plant. Using genome-wide identification, transcriptome profile analysis, and phylogenetic relationships, this research provides a new perspective on the critical functions of ABC transporters in S. miltiorrhiza. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12864-021-07623-0.