Search

Achieving ideal plant architecture is of utmost importance for plant improvement to meet the demands of ever-increasing population. The wish list of ideal plant architecture traits varies with respect to its utilization and environmental conditions. Late seed development in woody plants poses difficulties for their propagation, and an increase in regeneration capacity can overcome this problem. The transition of a plant through sequential developmental stages e.g., embryonic, juvenile, and maturity is a well-orchestrated molecular and physiological process. The manipulation in the timing of phase transition to achieve ideal plant traits and regulation of metabolic partitioning will unlock new plant potential. Previous studies demonstrate that micro RNA156 (miR156) impairs the expression of its downstream genes to resist the juvenile-adult-reproductive phase transition to prolonged juvenility. The phenomenon behind prolonged juvenility is the maintenance of stem cell integrity and regeneration is an outcome of re-establishment of the stem cell niche. The previously reported vital and diverse functions of miR156 make it a more important case of study to explore its functions and possible ways to use it in molecular breeding. In this review, we proposed how genetic manipulation of miR156 can be used to reshape plant development phase transition and achieve ideal plant architecture. We have summarized recent studies on miR156 to describe its functional pattern and networking with up and down-stream molecular factors at each stage of the plant developmental life cycle. In addition, we have highlighted unaddressed questions, provided insights and devised molecular pathways that will help researchers to design their future studies. • MicroRNAs are promising tools for orchestrating plant architecture. • Manipulating developmental phase transitions can sustain or enhance desired traits. • MiR156 regulates phase transition, delays aging, and prolongs juvenility. • MiR156-mediated genetic engineering can manipulate phase transition. • MiR156, a phase driver, offers sustainable agriculture, food security, and advancement in plant research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Certain obligate parasites induce complex and substantial phenotypic changes in their hosts in ways that favor their transmission to other trophic levels. However, the mechanisms underlying these changes remain largely unknown. Here we demonstrate how SAP05 protein effectors from insect-vectored plant pathogenic phytoplasmas take control of several plant developmental processes. These effectors simultaneously prolong the host lifespan and induce witches' broom-like proliferations of leaf and sterile shoots, organs colonized by phytoplasmas and vectors. SAP05 acts by mediating the concurrent degradation of SPL and GATA developmental regulators via a process that relies on hijacking the plant ubiquitin receptor RPN10 independent of substrate ubiquitination. RPN10 is highly conserved among eukaryotes, but SAP05 does not bind insect vector RPN10. A two-amino-acid substitution within plant RPN10 generates a functional variant that is resistant to SAP05 activities. Therefore, one effector protein enables obligate parasitic phytoplasmas to induce a plethora of developmental phenotypes in their hosts. [Display omitted] • Phytoplasma SAP05 proteins bind plant SPL and GATA transcription factors and RPN10 • SAP05 mediates degradation of SPLs and GATAs in a ubiquitin-independent manner • SAP05 decouples plant developmental transitions and induces witches' broom symptoms • Engineering of plant RPN10 confers resistance to SAP05 activities A virulence factor from an insect-vectored parasitic phytoplasma induces ubiquitin receptor-mediated developmental changes in the plant host that favor pathogenesis. This effector-receptor interaction can be modulated to engineer plants resistant to parasitic infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]