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Abiotic stress poses constant challenges for plant survival and is a serious problem for global agricultural productivity. On a molecular level, stress conditions result in elevation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) production causing oxidative stress associated with oxidation of proteins and nucleic acids as well as impairment of membrane functions. Adaptation of root growth to ROS accumulation is facilitated through modification of auxin and cytokinin hormone homeostasis. Here, we report that in Arabidopsis root meristem, ROS-induced changes of auxin levels correspond to decreased abundance of PIN auxin efflux carriers at the plasma membrane (PM). Specifically, increase in H2O2 levels affects PIN2 endocytic recycling. We show that the PIN2 intracellular trafficking during adaptation to oxidative stress requires the function of the ADP-ribosylation factor (ARF)-guanine-nucleotide exchange factor (GEF) BEN1, an actin-associated regulator of the trafficking from the PM to early endosomes and, presumably, indirectly, trafficking to the vacuoles. We propose that H2O2 levels affect the actin dynamics thus modulating ARF-GEF-dependent trafficking of PIN2. This mechanism provides a way how root growth acclimates to stress and adapts to a changing environment., (� The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Japanese Society of Plant Physiologists. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Small GTPases of the Arf family, by cycling between GDP-bound inactive and GTP-bound active states, play a crucial role not only in the regulation of membrane traffic and dynamics but also in rearrangement of actin cytoskeleton. The exchange of GDP for GTP on Arf is catalyzed by a family of guanine nucleotide-exchange factors (GEFs) containing a Sec7 domain. The Sec7 domain is a target of brefeldin A, which inhibits various trafficking processes and induces organelle disintegration. During the past few years, significant progress has been made in elucidating the structure and catalytic mechanism of the Sec7 domains and physiological functions of the Sec7 domain-containing Arf-GEFs. Here we review the structures and functions of Arf-GEFs by focusing on the regulation of membrane traffic.

Profilin is an actin monomer-binding protein implicated in the polymerization of actin filaments. In the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the pfy1-111 rho2delta double mutant has severe growth and actin cytoskeletal defects. The GEA1 and GEA2 genes, which code for paralog guanosine exchange factors for Arf proteins, were identified as multicopy suppressors of the mutant phenotype. These two genes restored the polarized distribution of actin cortical patches and produced visible actin cables in both the pfy1-111 rho2delta and pfy1delta cells. Thus, overexpression of GEA1 or GEA2 bypassed the requirement for profilin in actin cable formation. In addition, gea1 gea2 double mutants showed defects in budding and in actin cytoskeleton organization, while overexpression of GEA1 or GEA2 led to the formation of supernumerary actin cable-like structures in a Bni1p/Bnr1p-dependent manner. The ADP-ribosylation factor Arf3p may be a target of Gea1p/Gea2p, since overexpression of ARF3 partially suppressed the profilin-deficient phenotype and a deletion of ARF3 exacerbated the phenotype of a pfy1-111 mutant. Gea1p, Gea2p, Arf1p, and Arf2p but not Arf3p are known to function in vesicular transport between the endoplasmic reticulum and the Golgi. In this work, we demonstrate a role for Gea1p, Gea2p, and Arf3p in the organization of the actin cytoskeleton.

Cell movements are essential to life, in a variety of aspects including development, repair and defence processes. Cell migration is a multifactorial process in which a number of distinct events occur simultaneously. Besides its strong appeal towards the basic sciences, the molecular mechanisms of cell migration have long been major targets of oncology, including clinical studies aiming for cancer therapy and prevention. For the further advancement of these studies, as well as for the benefit of its clinical applications, it is important to understand the fundamental machinery and mechanisms regulating cell adhesion and motility. Here the possible roles of a small GTP-binding protein, Arf6, in epithelial cell adhesion and migration, and also in cancer cell invasion, are discussed.

We show that blockers of phospholipase D (PLD) reduce fMLP-triggered exocytosis of secretory vesicles effectively. In accordance with this, the PLD product phosphatidic acid (PA) was able to induce mobilization of secretory vesicles. Although PLD seems to play a role in the release of all neutrophil granule types, exogenous PA alone was not sufficient to activate the exocytosis of primary and secondary granules, suggesting that in the case of these granules, additional signaling factors are required to initiate the secretory responses. The ADP-ribosylation factor (ARF)-inhibitor brefeldin A (BFA) inhibited the fMLP-stimulated O2*- production strongly, whereas it did not influence any of the exocytic responses, and no significant effect of BFA was detected on the O2*- generation induced by other stimuli. On the basis of these results, we propose that upon chemoattractant stimulation, PLD activity is involved in induction of degranulation and O2*- production, but a BFA-sensitive ARF is only required to the activation of the NADPH oxidase. This ARF action seems to participate exclusively in the signaling pathway between the fMLP receptor and the oxidase.

The titan (ttn) mutants of Arabidopsis exhibit dramatic alterations in mitosis and cell cycle control during seed development. Endosperm development in these mutants is characterized by the formation of giant polyploid nuclei with enlarged nucleoli. Embryo development is accompanied by significant cell enlargement in some mutants (ttn1 and ttn5) but not others (ttn2 and ttn3). We describe here the molecular cloning of TTN5 using a T-DNA-tagged allele. A second allele with a similar phenotype contains a nonsense mutation in the same coding region. The predicted protein is related to ADP ribosylation factors (ARFs), members of the RAS family of small GTP binding proteins that regulate various cellular functions in eukaryotes. TTN5 is most closely related in sequence to the ARL2 class of ARF-like proteins isolated from humans, rats, and mice. Although the cellular functions of ARL proteins remain unclear, the ttn5 phenotype is consistent with the known roles of ARFs in the regulation of intracellular vesicle transport.

We show here that A10 cells express the phospholipase D (PLD) isoforms PLD1b and PLD2. The activation of PLD in these cells by angiotensin II (AngII), endothelin-1 (ET-1), and platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) was found to be sensitive to inhibitors of the activation of ADP-ribosylation factor (ARF) but not to blockers of Rho protein function. PDGF, AngII, and ET-1 induced the binding of ARF proteins to cell membranes in a permeabilized cell assay. Cells permeabilized and depleted of ARF were no longer sensitive to stimulation with AngII, ET-1, or PDGF, but the addition of recombinant myristoylated human ARF1 restored agonist-dependent PLD activity. Expression of dominant negative ARF mutants blocked receptor-dependent activation of PLD. PLD activity was also potently stimulated by treatment with phorbol esters, but this activity was only partially inhibited by brefeldin A or by the overexpression of ARF dominant negative mutants. Transient expression of catalytically inactive mutants of PLD2, but not PLD1, inhibited significantly PDGF- and AngII-dependent PLD activity. We conclude: 1) the activation of PLD by cell surface receptors occurs primarily by an ARF-dependent mechanism in A10 cells, whereas the activation of PLD by protein kinase C-dependent pathways is only partially dependent on the regulation of ARF proteins; and 2) cell surface receptors, such as AngII and PDGF, signal primarily via PLD2 in A10 cells.