Methods are provided by which plants and seeds thereof maybe modified to express a coding region of interest using a promoter sequence operativelylinked to the coding region. The promoter sequence is an isolated antiquitin (OsAntl) promoter sequence including SEQ ID NO: 1. The coding regionof interest may encode a nitrogen utilization protein, suitably alanine aminotransferase.Methods to develop plants that have increased biomass andseed yield are also presented. Furthermore, plants maybe produced that maintain a desired yield while reducing the need for high levelsof nitrogen application.
