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Background: Nitrogen (N) foraging, the ability of plants to promote preferential root growth in N-rich patches of soil, is fundamental to the competitiveness and wellbeing of plants. A unique \"split-root\" system, where a heterogenous N environment stimulates root foraging, provides a powerful experimental model to study the mechanisms underlying root foraging in model (Arabidopsis) and/or crop plants.Results: We used the split-root set up to capture early molecular events involved in systemic N-signaling after exposure to a heterogeneous N signal, through time-course transcriptomic analysis across shoots and roots of Arabidopsis. We found that a histone methyltransferase, SET DOMAIN GROUP 8 (SDG8), is necessary for root N-foraging, suggesting a previously unknown role for chromatin regulation in mediating the preferential root growth response to colonize N-rich patches. To determine if the underlying molecular mechanism is conserved in evolution, we compared the root foraging behavior from model-to-crop (Arabidopsis, tomato and maize). Our analysis showed the model and crop species shared a root N-foraging growth.

The new edition of Physicochemical and Environmental Plant Physiology uses elementary chemistry, physics, and mathematics to explain and develop key concepts in plant physiology. In fundamental ways, all physiological processes that occur in cells, tissues, organs, and organisms obey such relations. Topics include diffusion, membranes, water relations, ion transport, photochemistry, bioenergetics of energy conversion, photosynthesis, environmental influences on plant temperature, and gas exchange for leaves and whole plants. This new edition maintains the unparalleled commitment to clear presentation and improves upon the user friendliness of the previous versions.

The ten countries that make up southern Africa are collectively a hot-spot of medicinal plant knowledge, with a unique preference for the utilization of bark over leaves from possibly hundreds of species. The most popular 86 medicinal bark species were identified in an earlier survey of various muthi markets around Johannesburg, and are listed in the current review, out of which chemical data was found for 63 and tabulated. The chemistry of medicinal bark species is, however, incomplete, since many scholars focused their research on metabolites of interest to their research groups, such as essential oils, lipophilic compounds, alkaloids or saponins, to the exclusion of other specialized metabolites present in the respective biota. From the current phytochemical analysis, the medicinal potential of bark relative to leaves is not obvious, as it is dependent on factors such as quantity of specialized metabolites (potency), their identities and anecdotal accounts from traditional healers. Nevertheless, the preference for bark may be due to empirical outcomes in therapy. Southern African medicinal bark species demonstrate an extremely diverse pool of unique/new or relatively unheard of natural products, such as calondendrolide from C. capense, combretastatin from C. caffrum, capensin from C. capense, crotohalimaneic acid from C. sylvaticus, ekebergins from E. capensis, entandrophragmin from E. caudatum, lysisteisoflavone from E. lysistemon, kigelinone from K. africana, holstinones from O. holstii, piptadeniaoside from P. africanum, rauvolfianoids from R. caffra, tetrapterosides from T. tetraptera, voacangine from V. thouarsii, warburganal from W. salutaris and mucronine from Z. mucronata. The review concludes by briefly commenting on pharmacokinetic aspects associated with ingestion or topical application of bark metabolites.

Plant cell adhesion is essential for development and stress response, mediated by pectin-rich middle lamella deposition between cell walls. However, the precise control mechanism of cell adhesion remains unclear. The qua2-1 and esmd1-1 mutants provide a better understanding of this process and suggest a signaling pathway triggering the loss and restoration of adhesion via cell wall modifications. This study attempts to characterize the potential regulatory role of endogenous oligogalacturonides (OGs) and pectin modifications in the control of cell adhesion in Arabidopsis. From dark-grown hypocotyls, our extraction revealed seven distinct endogenous OGs with varying polymerization and modifications. Abundance variations of OGs were observed among wild type, qua2-1, esmd1-1, and qua2-1/esmd1-1 mutants. The structure of homogalacturonans was analyzed by enzymatic fingerprint, in order to identify changes in esterification patterns. Expression analysis of pectin-modifying enzymes showed significant variations in PME, PMEI, and PAE genes. Gene expressions correlate with homogalacturonans modifications and cell adhesion phenotypes. This study enhances our understanding of a feedback loop between the endogenous OGs, homogalacturonans esterification fine tuning, and pectin remodeling enzymes expression in controlling cell adhesion.

The elevation of atmospheric CO2 leads to a decline in the plant mineral content, which poses a major threat to food security in the coming decades. To date, very few genes have been identified as having a role in the negative effect of elevated CO2 on plant mineral composition. Yet, several studies have shown a certain degree of diversity in the ionome's response to elevated CO2, associated with genotypic variation. This suggests the existence of genetic factors controlling the effect of CO2 on ionome composition. However, no large-scale studies have been carried out to date to explore the genetic diversity of the ionome responses to elevated CO2. Here, we used six hundred Arabidopsis thaliana accessions, representing geographical distributions ranging from worldwide to regional and local environments, to analyze the natural genetic variation underlying the negative effect of elevated CO2 on the ionome composition in plants. We show that the growth under elevated CO2 leads to a global and important decrease of the ionome content whatever the geographic distribution of the population. We also observed a high range of genetic diversity in the response of the ionome composition to elevated CO2, and we identified sub-populations, showing effects on their ionome ranging from the most pronounced to resilience or even to a benefit in response to elevated CO2. Using genome-wide association mapping on the response of each mineral element to elevated CO2 or on integrative traits, we identified a large set of QTLs and genes associated with the ionome response to elevated CO2. Finally, we demonstrate that manipulating the function of one of these genes can mitigate the negative effect of elevated CO2 on the plant mineral composition. Therefore, this resource will contribute to understand the genetic mechanisms underlying the negative effect of elevated CO2 on the mineral composition of plants, and to the development of biofortified crops adapted to a high-CO2 world.

In this article [1] the wrong figure appeared as Fig. 5. In Fig. 5a and 5b, between the x-axis and the axis legends, there is a line that was not initially present in figure. Uncorrected figure: (Figure presented.) The figure should have appeared as shown below. Corrected figure (Figure presented.) © The Author(s) 2024.

Lo vegetal y lo fantástico. Presentación

Artificial mechanical perturbations affect chromatin in animal cells in culture. Whether this is also relevant to growing tissues in living organisms remains debated. In plants, aerial organ emergence occurs through localized outgrowth at the periphery of the shoot apical meristem, which also contains a stem cell niche. Interestingly, organ outgrowth has been proposed to generate compression in the saddle-shaped organ-meristem boundary domain. Yet whether such growth-induced mechanical stress affects chromatin in plant tissues is unknown. Here, by imaging the nuclear envelope in vivo over time and quantifying nucleus deformation, we demonstrate the presence of active nuclear compression in that domain. We developed a quantitative pipeline amenable to identifying a subset of very deformed nuclei deep in the boundary and in which nuclei become gradually narrower and more elongated as the cell contracts transversely. In this domain, we find that the number of chromocenters is reduced, as shown by chromatin staining and labeling, and that the expression of linker histone H1.3 is induced. As further evidence of the role of forces on chromatin changes, artificial compression with a MicroVice could induce the ectopic expression of H1.3 in the rest of the meristem. Furthermore, while the methylation status of chromatin was correlated with nucleus deformation at the meristem boundary, such correlation was lost in the h1.3 mutant. Altogether, we reveal that organogenesis in plants generates compression that is able to have global effects on chromatin in individual cells.

Nitrate (NO 3 − ) is a major nutrient promoting plant growth and crop yield. Vacuolar nitrate storage is essential for nitrate acquisition and remobilization within the plant. However, the transcriptional regulation of transporters facilitating nitrate influx into the vacuole remains unclear. Here, we identified a bHLH transcription factor, ZmbHLH118, that negatively regulates the expression of ZmCLCa , thereby modulating nitrate vacuolar loading and uptake in maize ( Zea mays ). ZmbHLH118 overexpression and ZmCLCa loss‐of‐function in maize impaired root NO 3 − uptake, and further reduced nitrate content and plant growth. Moreover, ZmbHLH118 directly binds to the promoter and inhibits the expression of ZmCLCa , which encodes a tonoplast‐localized nitrate transporter. Electrophysiological analysis showed that ZmCLCa mediates NO 3 − fluxes across the vacuolar membrane, indicating that ZmCLCa‐mediated NO 3 − influx is required for vacuolar nitrate storage. Our data identify the ZmbHLH118 as a molecular actor of the transcriptional regulation of ZmCLCa in response to extracellular nitrate. This provides insights into the regulatory mechanisms acting upstream of the CLCa‐mediated vacuolar nitrate transport. Finally, field assays showed that the regulation mechanisms of vacuolar nitrate affect maize growth and grain yield, highlighting their value for nitrogen use efficiency improvement in crop plants.

Depending on how the future will unfold, today's progress in biotechnology research has greater or lesser potential to be the basis of subsequent innovation. Tracking progress against indicators for different future scenarios will help to focus, emphasize, or de-emphasize discovery research in a timely manner and to maximize the chance for successful innovation. In this paper, we show how learning scenarios with a 2050 time horizon help to recognize the implications of political and societal developments on the innovation potential of ongoing biotechnological research. We also propose a model to further increase open innovation between academia and the biotechnology value chain to help fundamental research explore discovery fields that have a greater chance to be valuable for applied research.