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Lunasin, a novel bioactive peptide initially found in soybean, exhibits multiple biological functions. Here, we overexpressed lunasinin maize to generated the transgenic maize with high lunasin content for application in functional food. A maize variety YF464 was screened and used as receptor material (WT), and the identification of lunasin peptide in maize was demonstrated through Western blot and ultrahigh pressure liquid chromatography–electrospray ionization with tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC-ESI-MS/MS). Thirteen overexpression (OE) lines were obtained, then OE1 (182.34 ± 13.62 μg g−1) and OE2 (294.51 ± 34.25 μg g−1) were selected for further study based on high expression of lunasin. Lunasin extract from maize (LEM) presented significantly higher antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-cancer activity in OE lines than that from WT. Furthermore, LEM from OE1 and OE2 showed superior anti-proliferation function on human breast cancer cells MDA-MB-231 than that from WT. Combination analysis with matched proteins from transcriptome and proteome after lunasin exposure showed that genes and proteins associated with mitophagy was highly activated in MDA-MB-231 cells, indicated lunasin may act an important role in promoting mitophagy, inducing cell death. Therefore, lunasin overexpressing maize has a great potential as a functional food in the diets of patients with cancer, together with an alternative for dietary nutrition and health care in the future. More importantly, it will provide the scientific data for further exploration on its anti-cancer function.

Structural variation is an important source of genetic variation in wheat and have been important in the evolution of the wheat’s genome. Few studies have examined the relationship between structural variations and agronomy and drought tolerance. The present study identified structural chromosome variations (SCVs) in a doubled haploid (DH) population and backcross introgression lines (BC5F3) derived from Jinmai 47 and Jinmai 84 using fluorescence in situhybridization. There are one simple translocation, 10 present/absent variations (PAVs), and one copy number variation (CNV) between Jinmai 47 and Jinmai 84, which distributed in 10 chromosomes. Eight SCVs were associated with 15 agronomic traits. A PAV recombination occurred on chromosome 2A, which was associated with grain number per spike (GNS). The 1BL/1RS translocation and PAV.2D were associated with significant reductions in plant height, deriving from the effects on LI2-LI4 and UI, LI2-LI4, respectively. PAV.2D was also contributed to an increase of 3.13% for GNS, 1BL/1RS significantly increased spikelet number, grain length (GL), and grain thickness (GT). The effect of PAV.4A.1 on GL, PAV.6A on spike length (SL) and thousand-grain weight (TGW), PAV.6B on SL, GT and TGW were identified and verified. PAVs on chromosomes 2A, 6A, 1D, 2D, and a CNV on chromosome 4B were associated with the drought tolerance coefficients. Additive and interaction effects among SCVs were observed. Many previously cloned key genes and yield-related QTL were found in polymorphic regions of PAV.2B, PAV.2D, and CNV.4B. Altogether, this study confirmed the genetic effect of SCVs on agronomy and drought tolerance, and identification of these SCVs will facilitate genetic improvement of wheat through marker-assisted selection.