Interactions between sucrose and jasmonate signalling in the response to cold stress

Astrid Wingler,Benqi Yuan,Sergi Munné-Bosch,Maren Müller,Verónica Tijero

doi:10.1186/s12870-020-02376-6

Abstract

BackgroundJasmonates play an important role in plant stress and defence responses and are also involved in the regulation of anthocyanin synthesis in response to sucrose availability. Here we explore the signalling interactions between sucrose and jasmonates in response to cold stress in Arabidopsis.ResultsSucrose and cold treatments increased anthocyanin content additively. Comprehensive profiling of phytohormone contents demonstrated that jasmonates, salicylic acid and abscisic acid contents increased in response to sucrose treatment in plants grown on agar, but remained considerably lower than in plants grown in compost. The gibberellin GA3 accumulated in response to sucrose treatment but only at warm temperature. The role of jasmonate signalling was explored using the jasmonate response mutants jar1–1 and coi1–16. While the jar1–1 mutant lacked jasmonate-isoleucine and jasmonate-leucine, it accumulated 12-oxo-phytodienoic acid at low temperature on agar medium. Altered patterns of abscisic acid accumulation and higher sugar contents were found in the coi1–16 mutant when grown in compost. Both mutants were able to accumulate anthocyanin and to cold acclimate, but the jar-1-1 mutant showed a larger initial drop in whole-rosette photosystem II efficiency upon transfer to low temperature.ConclusionsHormone contents are determined by interactions between temperature and sucrose supply. Some of these effects may be caused indirectly through senescence initiation in response to sucrose availability. During cold stress, the adjustments of hormone contents may compensate for impaired jasmonate signalling, enabling cold acclimation and anthocyanin accumulation in Arabidopsis jasmonate response mutants, e.g. through antagonistic interactions between gibberellin and jasmonate signalling.

Highlights

Jasmonates play an important role in plant stress and defence responses and are involved in the regulation of anthocyanin synthesis in response to sucrose availability
Effects of cold and sucrose treatments on Fv/Fm and anthocyanin content In compost-grown plants, cold treatment led to a slight reduction in Fv/Fm in leaf six of all genotypes, but no significant genotype-specific effects (Fig. 1a)
A timecourse of the cold response until the date of harvest is shown in Additional file 1, demonstrating that, while Fv/ Fm dropped in response to cold treatment, no senescence-dependent decline in Fv/Fm occurred during the course of the experiment

Summary

Introduction

Jasmonates play an important role in plant stress and defence responses and are involved in the regulation of anthocyanin synthesis in response to sucrose availability. But above-zero temperatures activates physiological changes that result in cold acclimation in cold-hardy plants such as Arabidopsis. This process involves hormone signalling [1], in addition to changes in Wingler et al BMC Plant Biology (2020) 20:176 acclimated plants [6, 7]. Jasmonic acid (JA) content was positively correlated with that of sucrose in A. alpina accessions [8] which is in agreement with the observations that JA accumulation in response to stress in Arabidopsis seedlings is sugar dependent [12]. The fitness of these mutants is reduced under favourable conditions and under cold stress, but not under other forms of stress [16]

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Conclusion