Stress-mediated cis-element transcription factor interactions interconnecting primary and specialized metabolism in planta

• Main Authors: S. A. Sheshadri, M. J. Nishanth, Bindu Simon
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2016-11-01
• Series: Frontiers in Plant Science
• Subjects: Gene Expression Regulation; Stress, Physiological; primary metabolism; Specialized Metabolism; cis-elements
• Online Access: http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpls.2016.01725/full

Plant specialized metabolites are being used worldwide as therapeutic agents against several diseases. Since the precursors for specialized metabolites come through primary metabolism, extensive investigations have been carried out to understand the detailed connection between primary and specialized metabolism at various levels. Stress regulates the expression of primary and specialized metabolism genes at the transcriptional level via transcription factors binding to specific cis-elements. The presence of varied cis-element signatures upstream to different stress-responsive genes and their transcription factor binding patterns provide a prospective molecular link among diverse metabolic pathways. The pattern of occurrence of these cis-elements (overrepresentation/common) decipher the mechanism of stress-responsive upregulation of downstream genes, simultaneously forming a molecular bridge between primary and specialized metabolisms. Though many studies have been conducted on the transcriptional regulation of stress-mediated primary or specialized metabolism genes, but not much data is available with regard to cis-element signatures and transcription factors that simultaneously modulate both pathway genes. Hence, our major focus would be to present a comprehensive analysis of the stress-mediated interconnection between primary and specialized metabolism genes via the interaction between different transcription factors and their corresponding cis-elements. In future, this study could be further utilized for the overexpression of the specific transcription factors that upregulate both primary and specialized metabolism, thereby simultaneously improving the yield and therapeutic content of plants.