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Background Cell polarity establishment and maintenance is indispensable for plant growth and development. In plants, the YABBY transcription factor family has a distinct role in leaf asymmetric polarity establishment and lateral organ initiation. However, for the important sugar crop Saccharum, little information on YABBY genes is available. Results In this study, a total of 20 sequences for 7 SsYABBY genes were identified in the sugarcane genome, designated as SsYABBY1-7 based on their chromosome locations, and characterized by phylogenetic analysis. We provided a high-resolution map of SsYABBYs’ global expression dynamics during vegetative and reproductive organ morphogenesis and revealed that SsYABBY3/4/5 are predominately expressed at the seedling stage of stem and leaf basal zone; SsYABBY2/5/7 are highly expressed in ovules. Besides, cross-species overexpression and/or complementation verified the conserved function of SsYABBY2 in establishing leaf adaxial-abaxial polarity and ovules development. We found that the SsYABBY2 could successfully rescue the leaves curling, carpel dehiscence, and ovule abortion defects in Arabidopsis crc mutant. Conclusions Collectively, our study demonstrates that SsYABBY genes retained a conserved function in establishing and preserving leaf adaxial-abaxial polarity and lateral organ development during evolution.

In plants, calcineurin B-like proteins (CBLs) and their interacting kinase, CBL-interacting protein kinases (CIPKs), perform essential roles in mediating responses to various extracellular cues, including biotic and abiotic stresses. Several CIPK genes have been functionally characterized in different plant species. However, to date, the functions of pineapple CIPKs have not been investigated, which limits their potential use in molecular breeding. Here we functionally characterized an AcCIPK18 of pineapple and verified its role in salt, drought, heat stresses and immunity. Bioinformatics studies and phylogenetic analysis showed that AcCIPK18 is homologous to CIPK6 of Arabidopsis. Expression analysis shows that AcCIPK18 gets induced by salt, osmotic, heat and ABA. Besides, the ectopic expression of AcCIPK18 increased tolerance to salt, drought and heat stress but displayed sensitivity against fungal infection in Arabidopsis. We found that overexpression of AcCIPK18 changes the ROS homeostasis by altering the expression of several ABA signaling genes. These results provide evidence for the involvement of AcCIPK18 in multiple stress responses and advocates that AcCIPK18 could be used as a potential candidate gene for improving tolerance against multiple abiotic stress.