Abstract: A coldinduced plasma membrane protein which plays a protective role in avoiding freezing injury for some plants is one of hydrophobic proteins. A gene, named as DiRCI, was isolated from the cDNA library of Davidia involucrata, containing an open reading frame of 174 bp flanked by a 92 bp 5′untranslated sequence and a long 273 bp 3′noncoding region. Alignment analysis indicated that the deduced amino acid sequence of 57 amino acids was high conserved with the MpRCI from Plantago asiatica, and the identity was 895%. Semiquantitative reverse transcriptionpolymerase chain reaction (RTPCR) analysis showed that DiRCI wasn′t detected in various organs of Dinvolucrata above 25℃. When the plant grew under 8℃, the gene expressed in leaves, leafstalk and seeds, but not the roots. The expression level gradually increased after 4 h of the cold treatment and reached a maximum during 24-48 h, and then decreased. The results indicated the gene did have a relation with cold stress in plant and was predicted to be one DiRCI gene. The present data not only enrich gene resources of Dinvolucrata, but also laid a foundation for the research on molecular mechanism of plant acclimation to cold stress.

Key words: Davidia involucrata