Dynamic control of plant water use using designed ABA receptor agonists

• Published in: Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2019-10, Vol.366 (6464)
• Main Authors: Vaidya, Aditya S, Helander, Jonathan D M, Peterson, Francis C, Elzinga, Dezi, Dejonghe, Wim, Kaundal, Amita, Park, Sang-Youl, Xing, Zenan, Mega, Ryousuke, Takeuchi, Jun, Khanderahoo, Bardia, Bishay, Steven, Volkman, Brian F, Todoroki, Yasushi, Okamoto, Masanori, Cutler, Sean R
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Abscisic acid; Abscisic Acid - analogs & derivatives; Activation; Agonists; Agricultural production; Agriculture; Agrochemicals; Antitranspirants; Apertures; Arabidopsis; Arabidopsis - drug effects; Arabidopsis - physiology; Arabidopsis Proteins - agonists; Barley; Binding; Biological activity; Bridges; Carboxylic acids; Cereal crops; Crop yield; Crops; Crystal structure; Crystallography; Cyclohexane; Design optimization; Drought; Droughts; Dynamic control; Experiments; Flowering; Germination; Growing season; Hormones - chemistry; Hormones - pharmacology; Immunological tolerance; In vivo methods and tests; Ligands; Lycopersicon esculentum - physiology; Lysine; Menopause; Models, Molecular; Moisture content; Molecular structure; Organic chemistry; Plant hormones; Plant Transpiration - drug effects; Problem Solving; Receptor mechanisms; Receptors, Cell Surface - agonists; Screening; Seed germination; Soil water; Species; Species diversity; Stomata; Stress, Physiological - drug effects; Structure-function relationships; Sulfonamides; Thirst; Tomatoes; Triticum - physiology; Water; Water - physiology; Water use; Water use efficiency; Wheat; X-ray crystallography
• ISSN: 0036-8075; 1095-9203
• DOI: 10.1126/science.aaw8848

Drought causes crop losses worldwide, and its impact is expected to increase as the world warms. This has motivated the development of small-molecule tools for mitigating the effects of drought on agriculture. We show here that current leads are limited by poor bioactivity in wheat, a widely grown staple crop, and in tomato. To address this limitation, we combined virtual screening, x-ray crystallography, and structure-guided design to develop opabactin (OP), an abscisic acid (ABA) mimic with up to an approximately sevenfold increase in receptor affinity relative to ABA and up to 10-fold greater activity in vivo. Studies in reveal a role of the type III receptor for the antitranspirant efficacy of OP. Thus, virtual screening and structure-guided optimization yielded newly discovered agonists for manipulating crop abiotic stress tolerance and water use.