Characterization of PavDof2/6/15. A, Phylogenetic relationships between Dof family members in sweet cherry and Arabidopsis. The circles indicate candidate PavDofs. B, Multiple sequence alignment of the conserved Dof domain in 25 PavDof proteins. The four cysteine residues involved in the zinc finger structure and the nuclear localization signal motif are shown. Identical amino acids are highlighted. C, Heatmap representation of PavDof transcript levels in Zaodaguo. The arrows indicate the candidate PavDofs. D, Relative expression levels of PavDof2/6/15 during fruit development and ripening in Zaodaguo, as determined by RT–qPCR. Data are shown as means ± sd from three biological replicates, each biological replicate contains 15 fruits. SG, big green; MG, mid green; BG, big green; DG, degreening; YW, yellow white; IR, initial red; FR, full red; DR, dark red. E, Effect of ABA treatment on PavDof2/6/15 expression levels. PavActin (Genbank: FJ560908) was used as an internal control. Data are shown as means ± sd of three biological replicates. Different letters indicate significant differences by Duncan’s multiple range test with P < 0.05. CK, control check. F, Subcellular localization assay of PavDof2/6/15. GFP (Positive control) or the PavDof2/6/15-GFP constructs driven by the CaMV 35S promoter were individually transiently infiltrated into N. benthamiana leaves. Scale bars = 50 μm.