Abstract: ERF（ethylene-responsive factor） proteins are a large family of transcription factors in plants, which play an important role in plant growth and development. In order to study the function of a novel transcription factor SmERF1 in Salvia miltiorr-hiza, the coding sequence and expression pattern of SmERF1 were analyzed. And the changes of resistance, seco-ndary metabolites and hormones of SmERF1-overexpression transgenic plants were also detected. The results showed that SmERF1 contains only one AP2 domain, which is a typical ERF transcription factor. The expression of SmERF1 was induced by Me JA and yeast elicitor（YE）. The proline contents, SOD and POD activities of the Sm ERF1-overexpression lines were higher than those of wild-type plants, and the MDA contents decreased after NaCl treatment, which indicated that the salt resistance of the transgenic lines were enhanced. The plant hormone ABA contents were up-regulated and the GA contents decreased in SmERF1-overexpression transgenic plant. But the regulation effect by SmERF1 overexpression on the biosynthesis of tanshinones or salvianolic acids, was not strong. These results indicated that SmERF1 improved salt tolerance in S. miltiorrhiza by regulating ABA biosynthesis.