Abstract
Early Responsive to Dehydration (ERD) genes are rapidly induced in response to various biotic and abiotic stresses, such as bacteria, drought, light, temperature and high salt in Arabidopsis thaliana. Sixteen ERD of Arabidopsis thaliana (AtERD) genes have been previously identified. The lengths of the coding region of the genes are 504-2838 bp. They encode 137-745 amino acids. In this study, the AtERD genes structure and promoter are analyzed through bioinformatics, and a overall function is summarized and a systematic signal pathway involving AtERD genes is mapped. AtERD9, AtERD11 and AtERD13 have the GST domain. AtERD10 and AtERD14 have the Dehyd domain. The promoters regions contain 32 light responsive elements, 23 ABA responsive elements, 5 drought responsive elements, 5 meristem expression related elements and 132 core promoter elements. The study provides a theoretical guidance for subsequent studies of AtERD genes.