Studies on variation of phytochelatin 2 content and Metallothionein 2 gene expression in presence of cadmium stress in Plantago ovata forsk

Heavy metal toxicity poses a harmful threat to plants. Cadmium is a non-essential heavy metal which enters plant cell via soil as a result of human malpractices, pollution and industrial works and causes severe damage to plants. Our study focuses on the effects of Cadmium stress in the plant Plantago ovata (P. ovata) by observing the content of Phytochelatin 2 (PC2) and the expression of Metallothionein 2 (MT2) gene, both metal chelating agents. We observed the impact of Cadmium stress on phenotypic changes of P. ovata and performed Reverse Phase HPLC (RPHPLC) analysis to observe the changes in PC2 content when exposed to an increasing concentration of heavy metal stress. For MT2 gene expression, we performed the Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) technique. In case of PC2 we observed gradual increase in its content with response to heavy metal stress whereas it was observed that there is a considerable rise and a sudden fall in expression levels of MT2 gene when exposed to increasing levels of Cadmium stress. The results suggest that although both PC2 and MT2 are able to combat heavy metal stress, PC2 does so more effectively when compared to MT2