Causes and consequences of experimental variation in <i>Nicotiana benthamiana</i> transient expression
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS, cilt.17, sa.1, 2026 (SCI-Expanded, Scopus)
- Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
- Cilt numarası: 17 Sayı: 1
- Basım Tarihi: 2026
- Doi Numarası: 10.1038/s41467-026-69458-1
- Dergi Adı: NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
- Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Scopus, Aerospace Database, BIOSIS, Chemical Abstracts Core, EMBASE, Geobase, INSPEC, MEDLINE, Directory of Open Access Journals, Zoological Record, Natural Science Collection (ProQuest), Biological Science Database (ProQuest), Health Research Premium Collection (ProQuest), Pharma Collection (ProQuest), Technology Collection (ProQuest)
- Açık Arşiv Koleksiyonu: AVESİS Açık Erişim Koleksiyonu
- Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
Infiltration of Agrobacterium tumefaciens into Nicotiana benthamiana has become a foundational technique in plant biology, enabling efficient delivery of transgenes in planta with technical ease, robust signal, and relatively high throughput. Despite transient expression's prevalence in disciplines such as synthetic biology, little work has been done to describe and address the variability inherent in this system, a concern for experiments that rely on highly quantitative readouts. In a comprehensive analysis of N. benthamiana agroinfiltration experiments, we model sources of variability that affect transient expression. Our findings emphasize the need to validate normalization methods under the specific conditions of each study, as distinct normalization schemes do not always reduce variation either within or between experiments. Using a dataset of 1915 plants collected over three years, we develop a model of variation in N. benthamiana transient expression, using power analysis to determine the number of individual plants required for a given effect size. Drawing on our longitudinal data, these findings inform practical guidelines for minimizing variability through strategic experimental design and power analysis, providing a foundation for more robust and reproducible use of N. benthamiana in quantitative plant biology and synthetic biology applications.