Fiber Elongation-Dependent Aquaporin Expression in Different Cotton Cultivars.

Fiber length is an important component to measure cotton yield potential. Many research efforts have focused on development of cotton cultivars with higher fiber quality and yield potential. It is known that genetic diversity exists for fiber elongation. Understanding the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying cotton fiber elongation and the regulation of aquaporin gene expression is important assuming that water uptake facilitated by aquaporins is a major driving force for cotton fiber cell expansion. For the identification of aquaporins which expression is controlled temporally concurrent with fiber developmental stages, quantitative expression analysis across cultivars differing in fiber length was performed for two main aquaporin groups, PIPs and TIPs. Our research data will provide key resources that can be utilized towards the improvement of fiber quality through elucidating the relationship between aquaporin genes crucial in fiber elongation.