Regulating the Regulators: The Control of Transcription Factors in Plant Defense Signaling

• Published in: International journal of molecular sciences 2018-11, Vol.19 (12), p.3737
• Main Authors: Ng, Danny W-K, Abeysinghe, Jayami K, Kamali, Maedeh
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Abiotic stress; Arabidopsis - genetics; Arabidopsis - growth & development; Arabidopsis - immunology; Biosynthesis; Crop production; Defense mechanisms; External stimuli; Gene expression; Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; Genomes; Glycine max - genetics; Glycine max - growth & development; Glycine max - immunology; Kinases; Leucine zipper proteins; Meristems; Metabolites; Oryza - genetics; Oryza - growth & development; Oryza - immunology; Pathogens; Plant breeding; Plant Immunity - genetics; Plant Proteins - classification; Plant Proteins - genetics; Plant Proteins - immunology; Post-transcription; Post-translation; Proteins; Regulators; Review; Reviews; Signal Transduction; Stress, Physiological - genetics; Stress, Physiological - immunology; Transcription activation; Transcription factors; Transcription Factors - classification; Transcription Factors - genetics; Transcription Factors - immunology; Transcription, Genetic; Triticum - genetics; Triticum - growth & development; Triticum - immunology; Wild type; Zea mays - genetics; Zea mays - growth & development; Zea mays - immunology
• ISSN: 1422-0067; 1661-6596; 1422-0067
• DOI: 10.3390/ijms19123737

Being sessile, plants rely on intricate signaling pathways to mount an efficient defense against external threats while maintaining the cost balance for growth. Transcription factors (TFs) form a repertoire of master regulators in controlling various processes of plant development and responses against external stimuli. There are about 58 families of TFs in plants and among them, six major TF families (AP2/ERF (APETALA2/ethylene responsive factor), bHLH (basic helix-loop-helix), MYB (myeloblastosis related), NAC (no apical meristem (NAM), transcription activation factor (ATAF1/2), and cup-shaped cotyledon (CUC2)), WRKY, and bZIP (basic leucine zipper)) are found to be involved in biotic and abiotic stress responses. As master regulators of plant defense, the expression and activities of these TFs are subjected to various transcriptional and post-transcriptional controls, as well as post-translational modifications. Many excellent reviews have discussed the importance of these TFs families in mediating their downstream target signaling pathways in plant defense. In this review, we summarize the molecular regulatory mechanisms determining the expression and activities of these master regulators themselves, providing insights for studying their variation and regulation in crop wild relatives (CWR). With the advance of genome sequencing and the growing collection of re-sequencing data of CWR, now is the time to re-examine and discover CWR for the lost or alternative alleles of TFs. Such approach will facilitate molecular breeding and genetic improvement of domesticated crops, especially in stress tolerance and defense responses, with the aim to address the growing concern of climate change and its impact on agriculture crop production.