Cloning and Bioinformatics Studies on CCD1 Gene in Saffron (Crocus sativus L.)

Nowadays, saffron is considered as a strategic medicinal plant in Iran. Apocarotenoids are also known as economic compound in saffron stigmas. Therefore, isolation and functional analysis of genes involving in carotenoid metbolism in saffron has a great importance. In this study, regarding the role of CsCCD1 gene in saffron apocarotenoids biosynthesis, it was targeted for studying the genomic structure of Iranian saffron CCD1. ProtParam, SOPMA, ProtScale, Pfam, ProtComp, SignalP, TMHMM, TargetP and ChloroPwre are the softwares used for studying the physicochemical and physiological charachterizations of CCD1 protein. Swiss-Model server was used for investigate the 3D structure of CCD1 protein followed by Ramachandran plotting for structural validation of 3D model. The results of phylogenetic analysis showed that amino acid structure of CsCCD1 protein have the most similarity to CaCCD. It is also found that CsCCD1 protein has no signal sequence and transmembrane domains. In addition, the results of this study demonstrated that CCD1 protein belongs to carotenoid oxidase family and it is stable In vitro. The results of this study can provide valuable information on the behavior and response of the CCD1 enzyme in the pathway for the synthesis of apocarotenoids in saffron, and these results can be useful in future protein engineering programs.