1. Arabidopsis <scp>EARLY FLOWERING</scp> 3 increases salt tolerance by suppressing salt stress response pathways
- Author
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Selin Bülbül, Yasuhito Sakuraba, Giltsu Choi, Nam-Chon Paek, and Weilan Piao
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Mutant ,Circadian clock ,Arabidopsis ,Plant Science ,Biology ,03 medical and health sciences ,Stress, Physiological ,Transcription (biology) ,Circadian Clocks ,Basic Helix-Loop-Helix Transcription Factors ,Genetics ,Transcription factor ,Gene ,Phytochrome ,Arabidopsis Proteins ,Membrane Proteins ,Gigantea ,Salt Tolerance ,Cell Biology ,Plants, Genetically Modified ,biology.organism_classification ,Cell biology ,030104 developmental biology ,Mutation ,Reactive Oxygen Species ,Transcription Factors - Abstract
Arabidopsis EARLY FLOWERING3 (ELF3) functions in modulating light input to the circadian clock, as a component of ELF3-ELF4-LUX ARRHYTHMO (LUX) evening complex. However, the role of ELF3 in stress responses remains largely unknown. In this study, we show that ELF3 enhances plants' resilience to salt stress: ELF3-overexpressing (ELF3-OX) plants are salt-tolerant, while elf3 mutants are more sensitive to salt stress. The expressions of many salt stress- and senescence-associated genes are altered in elf3-1 and ELF3-OX plants compared with wild-type. During salt stress, ELF3 suppresses factors that promote salt stress response pathways, mainly GIGANTEA (GI), at the post-translational level, and PHYTOCHROME INTERACTING FACTOR4 (PIF4), at the transcriptional level. To enhance the salt stress response, PIF4 directly downregulates the transcription of JUNGBRUNNEN1 (JUB1/ANAC042), encoding a transcription factor that upregulates the expression of stress tolerance genes, DREB2A and DELLA. Furthermore, PIF4 directly upregulates the transcription of ORESARA1 (ORE1/ANAC092) and SAG29, positive regulators of salt stress response pathways. Based on our results, we propose that ELF3 modulates key regulatory components in salt stress response pathways at the transcriptional and post-translational levels.
- Published
- 2017
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