Abstract
Pre-exposing (priming) plants to mild, non-lethal elevated temperature improves their tolerance to a later higher-temperature stress (triggering stimulus), which is of great ecological importance. ‘Thermomemory’ is maintaining this tolerance for an extended period of time. NAM/ATAF1/2/CUC2 (NAC) proteins are plant-specific transcription factors (TFs) that modulate responses to abiotic stresses, including heat stress (HS). Here, we investigated the potential role of NACs for thermomemory. We determined the expression of 104 Arabidopsis NAC genes after priming and triggering heat stimuli, and found ATAF1 expression is strongly induced right after priming and declines below control levels thereafter during thermorecovery. Knockout mutants of ATAF1 show better thermomemory than wild type, revealing a negative regulatory role. Differential expression analyses of RNA-seq data from ATAF1 overexpressor, ataf1 mutant and wild-type plants after heat priming revealed five genes that might be priming-associated direct targets of ATAF1: AT2G31260 (ATG9), AT2G41640 (GT61), AT3G44990 (XTH31), AT4G27720 and AT3G23540. Based on co-expression analyses applied to the aforementioned RNA-seq profiles, we identified ANAC055 to be transcriptionally co-regulated with ATAF1. Like ataf1, anac055 mutants show improved thermomemory, revealing a potential co-control of both NAC TFs over thermomemory. Our data reveals a core importance of two NAC transcription factors, ATAF1 and ANAC055, for thermomemory.
Original language | English (US) |
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Journal | Scientific Reports |
Volume | 12 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jul 4 2022 |
Bibliographical note
KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2022-07-06Acknowledgements: The research was supported by funding from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia. NOA received support through a L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science 2014 Middle East Fellowship. SMS received funding from the Ministry for Science, Research and Art of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany (Az: 75533-30-20/1). BMR thanks the University of Potsdam, and SB thanks the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology for financial support. BMR thanks the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, project PlantaSYST (SGA-CSA No. 739582 under FPA No. 664620) for funding. TDW thanks the International Max Planck Research School ‘Primary Metabolism and Plant Growth’, Potsdam, for financial support. The authors thank Prof. Frank van Breusegem (Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium) for providing seeds of ANAC013-OE and knockdown (anac013-kd) lines.
Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- General