Abstract
A hallmark of plants is their adaptability of size and form in response to widely fluctuating environments. The metabolism and redistribution of the phytohormone auxin play pivotal roles in establishing active auxin gradients and resulting cellular differentiation. In Arabidopsis thaliana, cotyledons and leaves synthesize indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) from tryptophan through indole-3-pyruvic acid (3-IPA) in response to vegetational shade. This newly synthesized auxin moves to the hypocotyl where it induces elongation of hypocotyl cells. Here we show that loss of function of VAS2 (IAA-amido synthetase Gretchen Hagen 3 (GH3).17) leads to increases in free IAA at the expense of IAA-Glu (IAA-glutamate) in the hypocotyl epidermis. This active IAA elicits shade- and high temperature-induced hypocotyl elongation largely independently of 3-IPA-mediated IAA biosynthesis in cotyledons. Our results reveal an unexpected capacity of local auxin metabolism to modulate the homeostasis and spatial distribution of free auxin in specialized organs such as hypocotyls in response to shade and high temperature.
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Acknowledgements
We thank M. Geisler for the generous gift of BUM, and the Arabidopsis Biological Resource Center for mutant seeds. These studies were supported by US National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant 5R01GM52413 to J.C., the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems (VINNOVA) and the Swedish Research Council (VR) to K.L. and O.N., the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic (the National Program for Sustainability I No. LO1204) to O.N., the National Science Foundation under award nos EEC-0813570 and MCB-0645794 to J.P.N. and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (Z.Z., J.P.N., J.C.).
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Z.Y.Z. designed the experiments with the input from J.P.N. and J.C., Z.Y.Z., Y.X.G., O.N., W.C. and K.L. performed the experiments. Z.Y.Z., J.P.N. and J.C. wrote the manuscript. All authors discussed the results and commented on the experimental design.
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Zheng, Z., Guo, Y., Novák, O. et al. Local auxin metabolism regulates environment-induced hypocotyl elongation. Nature Plants 2, 16025 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nplants.2016.25
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nplants.2016.25
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