The key to why plants flower early in a warming world

Date:
July 10, 2023
Source:
European Synchrotron Radiation Facility
Summary:
Scientists have unveiled a new mechanism that plants use to sense
temperature. This finding could lead to solutions to counteract
some of the deleterious changes in plant growth, flowering and
seed production due to climate change.


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FULL STORY ========================================================================== Scientists have unveiled a new mechanism that plants use to sense
temperature.

This finding could lead to solutions to counteract some of the deleterious changes in plant growth, flowering and seed production due to climate
change.

The results are published today in PNAS.

The rise of temperatures worldwide due to climate change is having
detrimental consequences for plants. They tend to flower earlier than
before and rush through the reproductive process, which translates into
less fruits and less seeds and reduced biomass.

Scientists are now working on the plants' circadian clock, which
determines their growth, metabolism and when they flower. The key
thermosensor of the circadian clock is EARLY FLOWERING 3 (ELF3),
a protein that plays a vital role in plant development. It integrates
various environmental cues, such as light and temperature, with internal developmental signals, to regulate the expression of flowering genes
and determine when plants grow and bloom.

A team from the CEA, ESRF and CNRS have determined the molecular
mechanism of how ELF3 works in vitro and in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. As temperature rises, ELF3 undergoes a process called phase separation. This means that two liquid phases co-exist, in a similar way
to oil and water. "We believe that when it goes through phase separation,
it sequesters different protein partners like transcription factors,
which translates into faster growth and early flowering as a function of elevated temperature," explains Chloe Zubieta, CNRS Research Director from
the Laboratoire de Physiologie Cellulaire et Vegetale at the CEA Grenoble (CNRS/Univ. Grenoble Alpes/CEA/INRAE UMR 5168) and co-corresponding author
of the publication. "We are trying to understand the biophysics of the prion-like domain inside ELF3, which we think is the responsible for this
phase separation." ELF3 is a flexible protein, with no well-defined
structure, so it cannot be studied using X-ray crystallography, as
it needs to be in solution. Instead, the team used mainly Small Angle
X-ray Scattering. All existing models showed that the structure would be
highly disordered. Then the surprise came up: "I've seen many prion-like domains involved in phase separation, but this is the first time I saw something fundamentally different," explains Mark Tully, ESRF scientist
on BM29 and co-corresponding author of the publication.

The experiments showed that the prion-like domain forms a higher order monodisperse oligomer, which is vital for phase separation. This oligomer appears to be a ball of about 30 copies of the protein and acts as a
scaffold, which is likely necessary for it to interact with other proteins
in the plant cell. When the researchers increased the temperature, the
spheres came together to form a liquid phase and then, over time, an
ordered lamellar stack. Further experiments, using electron microscopy,
atomic force microscopy and X-ray powder diffraction on beamline ID23-1, confirmed the results.

"If we manage to tune when phase separation occurs as a function
of temperature, by mutating different amino acid residues, we could
ultimately delay flowering of plants under warmer conditions, allowing
them to establish more biomass and make more fruits and seeds,"
explains Stephanie Hutin, a scientist at the CEA and first author of
the paper. "Therefore, the next step in this research will be to add a different form of the ELF3 gene to the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana,
and to see what happens when we grow them at warm temperatures. If our
model is correct, we could do the same in crop species that have trouble adapting to warmer conditions," she concludes.

* RELATED_TOPICS
o Plants_&_Animals
# Endangered_Plants # Nature # Botany # Seeds
o Earth_&_Climate
# Climate # Global_Warming # Environmental_Issues #
Weather
* RELATED_TERMS
o Flowering_plant o Seed o
Temperature_record_of_the_past_1000_years o Global_warming
o Gymnosperm_Plants o Global_warming_controversy o
Paleoclimatology o Cotyledon

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Story Source: Materials provided by
European_Synchrotron_Radiation_Facility. Original written by Montserrat Capellas Espuny. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Stephanie Hutin, Janet R. Kumita, Vivien I. Strotmann, Anika
Dolata, Wai
Li Ling, Nessim Louafi, Anton Popov, Pierre-Emmanuel Milhiet,
Martin Blackledge, Max H. Nanao, Philip A. Wigge, Yvonne Stahl,
Luca Costa, Mark D. Tully, Chloe Zubieta. Phase separation and
molecular ordering of the prion-like domain of the Arabidopsis
thermosensory protein EARLY FLOWERING 3. Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences, 2023; 120 (28) DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2304714120 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/07/230710113932.htm

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