The sugar-signaling hub: Overview of regulators and interaction with the hormonal and metabolic network

Abstract

Plant growth and development has to be continuously adjusted to the available resources. Their optimization requires the integration of signals conveying the plant metabolic status, its hormonal balance, and its developmental stage. Many investigations have recently been conducted to provide insights into sugar signaling and its interplay with hormones and nitrogen in the fine-tuning of plant growth, development, and survival. The present review emphasizes the diversity of sugar signaling integrators, the main molecular and biochemical mechanisms related to the sugar-signaling dependent regulations, and to the regulatory hubs acting in the interplay of the sugar-hormone and sugar-nitrogen networks. It also contributes to compiling evidence likely to fill a few knowledge gaps, and raises new questions for the future.