Patent ID: 8916745

Claim:
A method for down-regulating or decreasing carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and/or water exchange in a guard cell of a plant, a plant cell, a plant leaf, or a plant part comprising: (a) transgenically providing to the guard cell of the plant, plant cell, plant leaf, or plant part a nucleic acid or gene comprising: (i) a nucleic acid encoding a CO 2 Sen (CO 2 sensor) protein; or (ii) a nucleic acid encoding a polypeptide having a carbonic anhydrase (CA) activity, or a β-carbonic anhydrase activity; wherein the nucleic acid or gene has at least about 95% sequence identity to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:4, SEQ ID NO:5, SEQ ID NO:7, SEQ ID NO:8, SEQ ID NO:20, SEQ ID NO:21, SEQ ID NO:22, SEQ ID NO:23, SEQ ID NO:24, SEQ ID NO:25, SEQ ID NO:26, SEQ ID NO:28, SEQ ID NO:29, SEQ ID NO:30, SEQ ID NO:31, SEQ ID NO:32, SEQ ID NO:33, SEQ ID NO:34 and/or SEQ ID NO:35, over the full length of a protein coding sequence or gene, or the protein or polypeptide is encoded by a nucleic acid or a gene having at least about 95% sequence identity to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:4, SEQ ID NO:5, SEQ ID NO:7, SEQ ID NO:8, SEQ ID NO:20, SEQ ID NO:21, SEQ ID NO:22, SEQ ID NO:23, SEQ ID NO:24, SEQ ID NO:25, SEQ ID NO:26, SEQ ID NO:28, SEQ ID NO:28, SEQ ID NO:29, SEQ ID NO:30, SEQ ID NO:31, SEQ ID NO:32, SEQ ID NO:33, SEQ ID NO:34 and/or SEQ ID NO:35, over the full length of a protein coding sequence or gene, wherein the nucleic acid encodes: (1) a CO 2 Sen (CO 2 sensor) protein that has a CO 2 Sen (CO 2 sensor) protein activity, and/or (2) a polypeptide having a carbonic anhydrase or a carbonate dehydratase activity, or a β-carbonic anhydrase activity, wherein the sequence identity is calculated using a sequence comparison algorithm consisting of a BLAST version 2.2.2 algorithm where a filtering setting is set to blastall -p blastp -d “nr pataa” -F F, and all other options are set to default; and (b) inserting into the guard cell and expressing, or overexpressing, the nucleic acid or gene of (a), thereby down-regulating or decreasing carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and/or water exchange in the guard cell.