The Plant Journal最新文献

Heat stress impacts all aspects of life, from evolution to global food security. Therefore, it becomes essential to understand how plants respond to heat stress, especially in the context of climate change. The heat stress response (HSR) involves three main components: sensing, signal transduction, and cellular reprogramming. Here, I focus on the heat stress sensing component. How can cells detect heat stress if it is not a signalling particle? To answer this question, I have looked at the molecular definition of heat stress. It can be defined as any particular rise in the optimum growth temperature that leads to higher-than-normal levels of reactive molecular species and macromolecular damage to biological membranes, proteins, and nucleic acid polymers (DNA and RNA). It is precisely these stress-specific alterations that are detected by heat stress sensors, upon which they would immediately trigger the appropriate level of the HSR. In addition, the work towards thermotolerance is complemented by a second type of response, here called the cellular homeostasis response (CHR). Upon mild and extreme temperature changes, the CHR is triggered by plant thermosensors, which are responsible for monitoring temperature information. Heat stress sensors and thermosensors are distinct types of molecules, each with unique modes of activation and functions. While many recent reviews provide a comprehensive overview of plant thermosensors, there remains a notable gap in the review literature regarding an in-depth analysis of plant heat stress sensors. Here, I attempt to summarise our current knowledge of the cellular sensors involved in triggering the plant HSR.

Tropospheric ozone (O₃) is a phytotoxic air pollutant that impairs photosynthesis. The mechanisms of O₃-induced reduction of mesophyll conductance (g_m) are not clear. We investigated the interaction of O₃ and leaf age on g_m by using structural equation modelling (SEM) for two poplar clones (I-214 and Oxford) exposed to three O₃ levels (ambient air, AA; 1.5 × AA; 2.0 × AA) in a free-air controlled experiment. Clone-specific phenological responses to elevated O₃ were found: I-214 showed a rapid leaf turnover and formed new productive leaves, whereas Oxford was more ‘conservative’ maintaining old or injured leaves. In the I-214 clone with fast leaf turnover, g_m was reduced due to increasing cell wall thickness in new leaves, a possible reaction to increase its resistance against O₃ damage. As I-214 leaves aged, a decrease in the fraction of the mesophyll surface area unoccupied by chloroplasts was observed at 2.0 × AA prior to a reduction in photosynthesis. In the Oxford clone with slow leaf turnover, g_m was mainly affected by physiological rather than structural factors: in particular, a marked reduction of g_m caused by abscisic acid (ABA) was noticed. As photosynthesis is limited by diffusional barriers, O₃ effects on g_m will be key for carbon sequestration modelling of O₃ pollution and climate change.

Plant specialized metabolites play key roles in diverse physiological processes and ecological interactions. Identifying structurally novel metabolites, as well as discovering known compounds in new species, is often crucial for answering broader biological questions. The Piper genus (Piperaceae family) is known for its special phytochemistry and has been extensively studied over the past decades. Here, we investigated the alkaloid diversity of Piper fimbriulatum, a myrmecophytic plant native to Central America, using a metabolomics workflow that combines untargeted LC–MS/MS analysis with a range of recently developed computational tools. Specifically, we leverage open MS/MS spectral libraries and metabolomics data repositories for metabolite annotation, guiding isolation efforts toward structurally new compounds (i.e., dereplication). As a result, we identified several alkaloids belonging to five different classes and isolated one novel seco-benzylisoquinoline alkaloid featuring a linear quaternary amine moiety which we named fimbriulatumine. Notably, many of the identified compounds were never reported in Piperaceae plants. Our findings expand the known alkaloid diversity of this family and demonstrate the value of revisiting well-studied plant families using state-of-the-art computational metabolomics workflows to uncover previously overlooked chemodiversity. To contextualize our findings within a broader biological context, we employed a workflow for automated mining of literature reports of the identified alkaloid scaffolds and mapped the results onto the angiosperm tree of life. By doing so, we highlight the remarkable alkaloid diversity within the Piper genus and provide a framework for generating hypotheses on the biosynthetic evolution of these specialized metabolites. Many of the computational tools and data resources used in this study remain underutilized within the plant science community. This manuscript demonstrates their potential through a practical application and aims to promote broader accessibility to untargeted metabolomics approaches.

Bioengineering efforts to increase oil in non-storage vegetative tissues, which constitute the majority of plant biomass, are promising sustainable sources of renewable fuels and feedstocks. While plants typically do not accumulate significant amounts of triacylglycerol (TAG) in vegetative tissues, we report here that the expression of a plastid-localized phospholipase A1 protein, DEFECTIVE IN ANTHER DEHISCENCE1 (DAD1), led to a substantial increase in leaf TAG in Arabidopsis. Using an inducible system to control DAD1 expression circumvented growth penalties associated with overexpressing DAD1 and resulted in a rapid burst of TAG within several hours. The increase of TAG was accompanied by the formation of oil bodies in the leaves, petioles, and stems, but not in the roots. Lipid analysis indicated that the increase in TAG was negatively correlated with plastidial galactolipid concentration. The fatty acid (FA) composition of TAG predominantly consisted of 18:3. Expression of DAD1 in the fad3fad7fad8 mutant, devoid of 18:3, resulted in comparable TAG accumulation with 18:2 as the major FA constituent, reflecting the flexible in vivo substrate use of DAD1. The transient expression of either Arabidopsis DAD1 or Nicotiana benthamiana DAD1 (NbDAD1) in N. benthamiana leaves stimulated the accumulation of TAG. Similarly, transgenic soybeans expressing Arabidopsis DAD1 exhibited an accumulation of TAG in the leaves, showcasing the biotechnological potential of this technology. In summary, inducible expression of a plastidial lipase resulted in enhanced oil production in vegetative tissues, extending our understanding of lipid remodeling mediated by DAD1 and offering a valuable tool for metabolic engineering.

Sugarcane, which provides 80% of global table sugar and 40% of biofuel, presents unique breeding challenges due to its highly polyploid, heterozygous, and frequently aneuploid genome. Significant progress has been made in developing genetic resources, including the recently completed reference genome of the sugarcane cultivar R570 and pan-genomic resources from sorghum, a closely related diploid species. Biotechnological approaches including RNA interference (RNAi), overexpression of transgenes, and gene editing technologies offer promising avenues for accelerating sugarcane improvement. These methods have successfully targeted genes involved in important traits such as sucrose accumulation, lignin biosynthesis, biomass oil accumulation, and stress response. One of the main transformation methods—biolistic gene transfer or Agrobacterium-mediated transformation—coupled with efficient tissue culture protocols, is typically used for implementing these biotechnology approaches. Emerging technologies show promise for overcoming current limitations. The use of morphogenic genes can help address genotype constraints and improve transformation efficiency. Tissue culture-free technologies, such as spray-induced gene silencing, virus-induced gene silencing, or virus-induced gene editing, offer potential for accelerating functional genomics studies. Additionally, novel approaches including base and prime editing, orthogonal synthetic transcription factors, and synthetic directed evolution present opportunities for enhancing sugarcane traits. These advances collectively aim to improve sugarcane's efficiency as a crop for both sugar and biofuel production. This review aims to discuss the progress made in sugarcane methodologies, with a focus on RNAi and gene editing approaches, how RNAi can be used to inform functional gene targets, and future improvements and applications.