HIGHLIGHTS
Overexpressing and RNA interferingOsDRAP1transgenic rice plants exhibited significantly improved and reduced drought tolerance, but accompanied with negative effects on development and yield. The dehydration responsive element binding (DREBs) genes are important transcription factors which play a crucial role in plant abiotic stress tolerances. In this study, we functionally characterized a DREB2-like gene,OsDRAP1conferring drought tolerance (DT) in rice.OsDRAP1, containing manycis-elements in its promoter region, was expressed in all organs (mainly expressed in vascular tissues) of rice, and induced by a variety of environmental stresses and plant hormones. OverexpressingOsDRAP1transgenic plants exhibited significantly improved DT; whileOsDRAP1RNA interfering plants exhibited significantly reduced DT which also accompanied with significant negative effects on development and yield. Overexpression ofOsDRAP1has a positive impact on maintaining water balance, redox homeostasis and vascular development in transgenic rice plants under drought stress.OsDRAP1interacted with many genes/proteins and could activate many downstream DT related genes, including important transcription factors such asOsCBSX3to response drought stress, indicating theOsDRAP1-mediated pathways for DT involve complex genes networks. All these results provide a basis for further complete understanding of theOsDRAP1mediated gene networks and their related phenotypic effects.