Xiangyu Xu 1 2 3, Hongyan Liu # 1 2, Myrthe Praat # 4 5, Gaston A Pizzio 6, Zhang Jiang 4, Steven Michiel Driever 7, Ren Wang 1 2, Brigitte Van De Cotte 1 2, Selwyn L Y Villers 1 2, Kris Gevaert 8 9, Nathalie Leonhardt 10, Hilde Nelissen 1 2, Toshinori Kinoshita 11, Steffen Vanneste 1 2 12, Pedro L Rodriguez 6, Martijn van Zanten 4, Lam Dai Vu 1 2 8 9 13, Ive De Smet 14 15
- PMID: 39613896
- DOI: 10.1038/s41477-024-01859-w
Abstract
Plants continuously respond to changing environmental conditions to prevent damage and maintain optimal performance. To regulate gas exchange with the environment and to control abiotic stress relief, plants have pores in their leaf epidermis, called stomata. Multiple environmental signals affect the opening and closing of these stomata. High temperatures promote stomatal opening (to cool down), and drought induces stomatal closing (to prevent water loss). Coinciding stress conditions may evoke conflicting stomatal responses, but the cellular mechanisms to resolve these conflicts are unknown. Here we demonstrate that the high-temperature-associated kinase TARGET OF TEMPERATURE 3 directly controls the activity of plasma membrane H+-ATPases to induce stomatal opening. OPEN STOMATA 1, which regulates stomatal closure to prevent water loss during drought stress, directly inactivates TARGET OF TEMPERATURE 3 through phosphorylation. Taken together, this signalling axis harmonizes stomatal opening and closing under high temperatures and/or drought. In the context of global climate change, understanding how different stress signals converge on stomatal regulation allows the development of climate-change-ready crops.
© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.