H2O2-Mediated Biotic and Abiotic Stress Responses in Plants

Abstract

Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is an important signaling molecule for various physiological processes that take place in higher plants during environmental adaptation. This article addresses the role of H2O2 in signal transduction and gene regulation in the context of a variety of biotic and abiotic stresses. Based on a comparative analysis using public and our own transcriptome data, we consider H2O2 as an independent mediator that acts in response to any of the plant stresses and also as having a role in the synergetic response to combinations of stress factors. Here, we propose H2O2 as a signal molecule that is able to trigger gene activation of a conserved set of genes that make a universal transcriptional subnetwork comprising tens of transcription factors.