Recent Advances in Metal Induced Stress Tolerance in Plants: Possibilities and Challenges

Abstract

Pollution is defined as a state of existence of detrimental contaminants in the environment, beyond the allowed limit, that can adversely affect the ecosystem. Soil and water can be influenced by numerous pollutants, especially heavy metals that are generated and discarded from industrial and other anthropogenic activities. These metals may enter living system through water and food chain, resulting in serious health consequences in humans and other living systems. Further, heavy metal contamination has become one of the important determinants of crop productivity recently. Heavy metal triggers various stimuli in plants, leading to complex mechanisms at genetic, molecular, biochemical and physiological level. Phytoremediation based approaches stands second in bioremediation technologies meant for cleanup of soils/sites contaminated with heavy metals. A clear understanding of biochemical and molecular mechanism is a prerequisite for genetic engineering approaches aiming phytoremediation. Recent development in plant genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics, aided understanding the role of several genes, transcription factors and metabolites involved in conferring metal tolerance. In this chapter, the use of transcriptomics approach and role of knockout mutants to identify metal stress induced genes are discussed. Further, the role of transcription factors and miRNAs in conferring metal tolerance is briefed.