Advances and challenges in uncovering cold tolerance regulatory mechanisms in plants

Abstract

Contents SummaryI.IntroductionII.Cold stress and physiological responses in plantsIII.Sensing of cold signals in plantsIV.Messenger molecules involved in cold signal transductionV.Cold signal transduction in plantsVI.Conclusions and perspectivesAcknowledgementsReferences Summary Cold stress is a major environmental factor that seriously affects plant growth and development, and influences crop productivity. Plants have evolved a series of mechanisms that allow them to adapt to cold stress at both the physiological and molecular levels. Over the past two decades, much progress has been made in identifying crucial components involved in cold‐stress tolerance and dissecting their regulatory mechanisms. In this review, we summarize recent major advances in our understanding of cold signalling and put forward open questions in the field of plant cold‐stress responses. Answering these questions should help elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying plant tolerance to cold stress.

Current research frontiers in plant epigenetics: an introduction to a Virtual Issue

“…Although a considerable portion of epigenetic variation correlates with trans‐acting genetic variants (Dubin et al ., 2016; Kawakatsu et al ., 2016), its nonrandom spatial distribution often exceeds the genetic structuring of natural populations. In addition, transcriptional rewiring through various epigenetic signals has been observed in plants upon multi‐generational exposure to abiotic stresses (Lämke & Bäurle, 2017), such as extreme temperatures (Ding et al , 2019; Friedrich et al , 2019), drought (Huang et al , 2019) and salinity (Yang & Guo, 2018). However, a dynamic interplay between specific genetic and epigenetic variants is commonly unravelled by studies of plant stress responses.…”

“…Multilayered pathways to modulate gene expression have been indeed reported by Ding et al . (2019), this time for plants under cold stress, including regulation by post‐translational histone modifications and DNA methylation, but also by miRNAs and cold‐responsive long noncoding RNAs. A study focused on histone modifications in Brachypodium distachyon (Huan et al , 2018) reported vernalization‐induced, dose‐dependent epigenetic changes for multiple genes that coordinate various biological processes to prepare for floral transition.…”

“…Although highly context‐dependent, plant biotic responses seem to reflect to a certain degree common pathways and epigenetic alterations to those induced by abiotic stress, with or without involving mediating signalling molecules such as jasmonic acid, salicylic acid and reactive oxygen species (Alonso et al , 2019b; Balao et al , 2018; Ding et al , 2019). In this Virtual Issue, Alonso et al .…”

“…Recent papers (for example Alonso et al , 2019b; Ding et al , 2019; Gáspár et al , 2019; Geng et al ., 2019) suggest that a better understanding of the epigenetic responses to environmental (i.e. both abiotic and biotic) stress is key to understanding rapid plant adaptation, plant immunity and for developing sustainable strategies for crops’ improvement in the face of global warming.…”

Cold induced chromatin compaction and nuclear retention of clock mRNAs resets the circadian rhythm

“…A probable trigger for this change is a temperature-induced influx of calcium that is stored in the nuclear envelope and the nuclear reticulum (Bootman et al, 2009). Not only is calcium known to boost compaction of chromatin fibers (Phengchat et al, 2016) but calcium release channels are activated in a temperature-dependent manner, operating as thermo-sensors in both mammalian (Bautista et al, 2007) and plant cells (Ding et al, 2019).…”