Plant interactomics under salt and drought stress

Abstract

Different abiotic stresses are responsible for low yield in crops. The same apparently goes for wheat; it is affected by both biotic and abiotic stresses. Among abiotic stresses, salinity and drought are the top ones. Plants have evolved elaborate mechanisms and ways to counter these threats. Studies in Arabidopsis have uncovered genes responsible for combating such stresses. For example, LEA protein gene is expressed under these conditions. Moreover, ERF plays the same role as LEA. Besides this different transcription factors are involved in stress tolerance which bind to different elements like C-repeat/DRE (CRT) and cause transcription of these stress tolerance genes under stresses like drought. A number of signaling transduction pathways are responsible for regulation of plant responses in stress. It is possible that TaCRT might be involved in direct or indirect activation of specific signal transduction pathways, which results in an enhanced metabolism. This enhanced metabolism enables cells to protect them from drought stress injury. Salt overly sensitive protein family (SOS1, SOS2, SOS3, and SOS4) is involved in salt tolerance. SOS1 gene is a genetic arrangement for salt tolerance because of Na+ /H+ antiporter which allows plants to reproduce and multiply under salt stress. In addition to the SOS1 gene, pyrroline carboxylate synthetase (P5cS) and betaine aldehyde dehydrogenase (BADH) genes are also expressed under salt stress. A number of genes are involved in circulation of Na+ under stress, like TaHKT1;5 in Mahuti wheat.