Stressed to Death: The Role of Transcription Factors in Plant Programmed Cell Death Induced by Abiotic and Biotic Stimuli

Abstract

Programmed cell death (PCD) is a genetically controlled pathway that plants can use to selectively eliminate redundant or damaged cells. In addition to its fundamental role in plant development, PCD can often be activated as an essential defense response when dealing with biotic and abiotic stresses. For example, localized, tightly controlled PCD can promote plant survival by restricting pathogen growth, driving the development of morphological traits for stress tolerance such as aerenchyma, or triggering systemic pro-survival responses. Relatively little is known about the molecular control of this essential process in plants, especially in comparison to well-described cell death models in animals. However, the networks orchestrating transcriptional regulation of plant PCD are emerging. Transcription factors (TFs) regulate the clusters of stimuli inducible genes and play a fundamental role in plant responses, such as PCD, to abiotic and biotic stresses. Here, we discuss the roles of different classes of transcription factors, including members of NAC, ERF and WRKY families, in cell fate regulation in response to environmental stresses. The role of TFs in stress-induced mitochondrial retrograde signaling is also reviewed in the context of life-and-death decisions of the plant cell and future research directions for further elucidation of TF-mediated control of stress-induced PCD events are proposed. An increased understanding of these complex signaling networks will inform and facilitate future breeding strategies to increase crop tolerance to disease and/or abiotic stresses.

Genome-Wide Association Mapping of bc-1 and bc-u Reveals Candidate Genes and New Adjustments to the Host-Pathogen Interaction for Resistance to Bean Common Mosaic Necrosis Virus in Common Bean

“…Whether the HR mechanism leads to systemic cell death (TN), delayed TN, or restricted vein necrosis (VN) is controlled by other proteins that recognize specific pathogen effectors, such as receptor molecules like RLK and NBS-LRR proteins. Moreover, several families of transcription factors have been discovered to regulate programmed cell death and HR, including members of bZIP, MBY, NAC, ERF, and WRKY ( Burke et al, 2020 ).…”

Abscisic Acid-Induced Stomatal Closure: An Important Component of Plant Defense Against Abiotic and Biotic Stress

“…PCD is a controlled process and is a consequence of high ROS and NO levels typically up-regulated by ABA ( Petrov et al, 2015 ; You and Chan, 2015 ). In plants, PCD is often an adaptive response during abiotic/biotic stress ( Fagundes et al, 2015 ; Burke et al, 2020 ). However, PCD can also aggravate plant disease ( Huysmans et al, 2017 ).…”

Intrinsic Disorder in Plant Transcription Factor Systems: Functional Implications

“…The NAC family is one of the largest plant-specific TF families with 110 genes in Arabidopsis [ 36 ] and 150 genes in rice [ 37 ]. NAC TFs are involved in responses to biotic and abiotic stresses and are key regulators of cross-talk between signaling pathways implicated in adaptation to environmental challenges [ 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 ]. In accordance with this, whole-genome expression studies in Arabidopsis showed that most NAC genes are induced by at least one type of abiotic stress signal [ 36 ].…”