Hydrogen sulfide and nitric oxide signal integration and plant development under stressed/non‐stressed conditions
Vijay Pratap Singh, Durgesh Kumar Tripathi, Vasileios Fotopoulos
Abstract
In the past decade, hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and nitric oxide (NO) have emerged as major signaling molecules which are involved in most life cycle processes in plants, i.e. from seed germination to plant death. H2S and NO-regulated development of plants requires integration of complex signaling networks and also involves other signaling pathways. Moreover, to re-establish cellular redox homeostasis under stress conditions, regulation of gene expression takes place, which helps in achieving an appropriate plant response. In this context, the most significant controls occur at the transcriptional, post-transcriptional and post-translational levels which help in acquiring adaptive changes in stress-challenged plants. Although various studies have demonstrated the role of H2S and NO in regulating a plethora of plant growth and development processes under stressed/non-stressed conditions, much remains to be elucidated regarding their roles in plant biology. Therefore, this special issue was organized to collect state-of-the-art plant research involving H2S and NO under changing environmental conditions. This special issue has collected seven reviews and 11 original research articles aimed at compiling a comprehensive status quo on the implication of H2S and NO signaling in plant biology. Review articles herein provide an up-to-date coverage of existing progress in this continuously growing research area. Prakash et al. (2019) have examined the role of NO and ROS (reactive oxygen species) in governing root system architecture in plants. Rai et al. (2019) have given an overview of NO and salicylic acid signaling towards acquired heat tolerance in plants. Paul and Roychoudhury (2019), Pandey and Gautam (2019) and Singh et al. (2019) have covered exhaustive current roles of H2S and NO in plants under changing environmental conditions. Finally, Sharma et al. (2019) and Shivaraj et al. (2019) have discussed molecular mechanisms and crosstalk of NO and H2S in metal stress tolerance. Research articles have covered diverse new roles of H2S and NO in regulating abiotic stress in plants. Kushwaha and Singh (2019) and Ahmad et al. (2019) have reported various mechanisms through which H2S regulates chromium toxicity in crop plants. Regulatory roles of NO and H2S were reported for salt and drought stress, as well as iron deficiency in plants (Batista et al. 2019, Gohari et al. 2019, Jahan et al. 2019, Kaya et al. 2019a). The role of NO and H2S along with that of Si was evaluated for the regulation of cadmium stress in plants (Kaya et al. 2019b). Muñoz-Vargas et al. (2019) have noticed inhibition of NADP-malic enzyme activity by H2S and NO in sweet pepper. Furthermore, the role of H2S was examined in regulating photosynthesis under overnight frost and daytime high light in avocado (Joshi et al. 2019). Finally, Kataria et al. (2019) have reported crucial role of nitrate reductase-dependent production of NO in regulating magnetopriming-induced salt tolerance in soybean. All together, this collection of articles presents new ideas and mechanisms for H2S and NO research in plant biology under varied environmental conditions. We strongly believe that these reports will strengthen our knowledge in this widely followed research area and will also serve as an incubator for novel ideas to further pursue H2S and NO plant research.