Fig. 3: CmoKARI1 moves from pumpkin root to cucumber shoot in response to chilling stress.

a Phenotypic changes and b, c relative expression of CmoKARI1 and CsaKARI in the leaf and root of grafted Csa/Cmo (Figleaf gourd, ‘Qianglishi’, and ‘Lizhiyuan’) under different time-course cold stress by qPCR. Each treatment includes n = 3 biological replicates, and each replicate includes 5 individual plants (mean ± s.d., one-way ANOVA followed by Duncan’s test). Lowercase letters indicate significant differences (p < 0.05). Cucumber ACTIN7 was used as an internal reference. d RT-PCR identification of CmoKARI1 in grafted Csa/Cmo with pumpkin rootstock ‘Lizhiyuan’, Figleaf gourd and ‘Qianglishi’ at 6 h, 12 h, and 24 h under chilling conditions. R pumpkin rootstock, C cucumber cotyledons, L cucumber true leaves. The normalized relative expression of RT-PCR bands was analyzed by comparing with the corresponding Csa/CmoACTIN7 using ImageJ software. Each treatment includes n = 3 biological replicates, and each replicate includes 5 individual plants (mean ± s.d.). Asterisks indicate mobile CmoKARI1 in cucumber cotyledons and true leaves. The samples derive from the same experiment, and the gels were processed in parallel. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.