Gene expression and regulation of higher plants under soil water stress.

Higher plants not only provide human beings renewable food, building materials and energy, but also play the most important role in keeping a stable environment on earth. Plants differ from animals in many aspects, but the important is that plants are more easily influenced by environment than animals. Plants have a series of fine mechanisms for responding to environmental changes, which has been established during their long-period evolution and artificial domestication.

Understanding molecular mechanisms for improving phytoremediation of heavy metal-contaminated soils.

Heavy metal pollution of soil is a significant environmental problem with a negative potential impact on human health and agriculture. Rhizosphere, as an important interface of soil and plants, plays a significant role in phytoremediation of contaminated soil by heavy metals, in which, microbial populations are known to affect heavy metal mobility and availability to the plant through release of chelating agents, acidification, phosphate solubilization and redox changes, and therefore, have potential to enhance phytoremediation processes. Phytoremediation strategies with appropriate heavy metal-adapted rhizobacteria or mycorrhizas have received more and more attention.

Understanding water deficit stress-induced changes in the basic metabolism of higher plants - biotechnologically and sustainably improving agriculture and the ecoenvironment in arid regions of the globe.

Water is vital for plant growth, development and productivity. Permanent or temporary water deficit stress limits the growth and distribution of natural and artificial vegetation and the performance of cultivated plants (crops) more than any other environmental factor. Productive and sustainable agriculture necessitates growing plants (crops) in arid and semiarid regions with less input of precious resources such as fresh water.

Bioengineering plant resistance to abiotic stresses by the global calcium signal system.

Considerable progresses have taken place both in the methodology available to study changes in intracellular cytosolic calcium and in our understanding of calcium signaling cascades. It is generally accepted that the global calcium signal system functions importantly in coping with plant abiotic stresses, especially drought stress, which has been proved further by the recent transgenic and molecular breeding reports under soil water deficits. In plant cells, calcium plays roles as a universal transducer coupling a wide range of extracellular stimuli with intracellular responses.

Advances of calcium signals involved in plant anti-drought.

Considerable progresses have taken place, both in the methodology available to study changes in intracellular cytosolic calcium and in our understanding of calcium signaling cascades, but how calcium signals function in plant drought resistance is questionable. In plant cells, calcium plays roles as a second messenger coupling a wide range of extracellular stimuli with intracellular responses. Different extracellular stimuli trigger specific calcium signatures: dynamics, amplitude and duration of calcium transients specify the nature, implication and intensity of stimuli.

Calcium as a versatile plant signal transducer under soil water stress.

The complexity of calcium profiles observed in plant cells has led to the realization that specific patterns of calcium propagation (now termed calcium signatures) encode specific information and relay it to downstream elements (effectors) for translation into corresponding cellular responses in higher plants. The concept of calcium signatures is now well established and the tight control of the temporal and spatial characteristics of cytosolic calcium alterations is considered to be responsible for the specificity of various cellular responses, in particular to environment-induced stresses. To date, three major classes of plant calcium sensors responsible for drought-stress signal transduction during soil water deficit have been identified.

Higher plant antioxidants and redox signaling under environmental stresses.

Main antioxidants in higher plants include glutathione, ascorbate, tocopherol, proline, betaine, and others, which are also information-rich redox buffers and important redox signaling components that interact with biomembrane-related compartments. As an evolutionary consequence of aerobic life for higher plants, reactive oxygen species (ROS) are formed by partial reduction of molecular oxygen. The above enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants in higher plants can protect their cells from oxidative damage by scavenging ROS.

Advances in functional regulation mechanisms of plant aquaporins: their diversity, gene expression, localization, structure and roles in plant soil-water relations (Review).

Aquaporins are important molecules that control the moisture level of cells and water flow in plants. Plant aquaporins are present in various tissues, and play roles in water transport, cell differentiation and cell enlargement involved in plant growth and water relations. The insights into aquaporins' diversity, structure, expression, post-translational modification, permeability properties, subcellular location, etc.

Water-deficit stress-induced anatomical changes in higher plants.

Water is vital for plant growth and development. Water-deficit stress, permanent or temporary, limits the growth and the distribution of natural vegetation and the performance of cultivated plants more than any other environmental factors do. Although research and practices aimed at improving water-stress resistance and water-use efficiency have been carried out for many years, the mechanism involved is still not clear.

Primary antioxidant free radical scavenging and redox signaling pathways in higher plant cells.

Antioxidants in plant cells mainly include glutathione, ascorbate, tocopherol, proline, betaine and others, which are also information-rich redox buffers and important redox signaling components that interact with cellular compartments. As an unfortunate consequence of aerobic life for higher plants, reactive oxygen species (ROS) are formed by partial reduction of molecular oxygen. The above enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants in higher plant cells can protect their cells from oxidative damage by scavenging ROS.

Aquaporin structure-function relationships: water flow through plant living cells.

Plant aquaporins play an important role in water uptake and movement-an aquaporin that opens and closes a gate that regulates water movement in and out of cells. Some plant aquaporins also play an important role in response to water stress. Since their discovery, advancing knowledge of their structures and properties led to an understanding of the basic features of the water transport mechanism and increased illumination to water relations.

The mutual responses of higher plants to environment: physiological and microbiological aspects.

Higher plants are different from animals in many aspects, but the important difference may be that plants are more easily influenced by environment. Plants have a series of fine mechanisms for responding to environmental changes, which has been established during their long-period evolution and artificial domestication. The relationship between higher plants and environment is influenced mutually.

Mutual physiological genetic mechanism of plant high water use efficiency and nutrition use efficiency.

Water deficiency and lower fertilizer utilization efficiency are major constraints of productivity and yield stability. Improvements of crop water use efficiency (WUE) and nutrient use efficiency (NUE) is becoming an important objective in crop breeding. With the introduction of new physiological and biological approaches, we can better understand the mutual genetics mechanism of high use efficiency of water and nutrient.

Where is the road to bio-water-saving for the globe?

The First International Conference on the Theory and Practices in Bio-water-saving (ICTPB) was held from May 21 to 25, 2006 in Beijing, China. This indicated that the work related to this hot topic on the globe has been paid more attention to. Most progress in this field has been presented from near 300 participating people worldwide, who were meeting together to discuss about the theory and practices of water-saving biology and how to serve global agricultural and ecological sustainable development.

Changes of some anti-oxidative physiological indices under soil water deficits among 10 wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) genotypes at tillering stage.

Drought is one of the major ecological factors limiting crop production and food quality globally, especially in the arid and semi-arid areas of the world. Wheat is the staple food for more than 35% of world population and wheat cultivation is mainly restricted to such zones with scarcity of water, so wheat anti-drought physiology study is of importance to wheat production, food safety and quality and biotechnological breeding for the sake of coping with abiotic and biotic conditions. The current study is to investigate changes of anti-oxidative physiological indices of 10 wheat genotypes at tillering stage.

On evolution and perspectives of bio-watersaving.

As shortage in water resources is a fact, bio-watersaving becomes one hot topic at present. The concept of bio-watersaving has been developed from agronomic watersaving to physiological watersaving then to gene watersaving. The definition of bio-watersaving is yielding more agricultural productions under the same water condition by exploiting the physiological and genetic potential of organisms themselves.

Relationship between water use efficiency (WUE) and production of different wheat genotypes at soil water deficit.

Through 2-year field experiments, 7 wheat genotypes were better in their field yield. These 7 wheat genotypes and other 3 wheat species, which are being popularized on a large scale in different locations of China, were selected as experimental materials for the sake of measuring their difference in WUE and production and comparing their relationship at soil water deficits, future more, providing better drought resistance lines and theoretical guide for wheat production and practices and exploring anti-drought physiological mechanisms of different wheat genotypes. Under the condition of 3 soil-water-stress treatments (75% field capacity (FC), 55% FC, 45% FC, named level 1, level 2 and level 3, respectively), pot experiments for them were conducted and the related data were collected from their life circle.

Investigation on the relationship of proline with wheat anti-drought under soil water deficits.

Proline (content) is closely with plant anti-drought, especially under soil water deficits. Many reports from crops and other plants have proved this. Wheat is the second important crop on the globe, whose research in this aspect of importance for food quality, safety, and yield in field.

Understanding molecular mechanism of higher plant plasticity under abiotic stress.

Higher plants play the most important role in keeping a stable environment on the earth, which regulate global circumstances in many ways in terms of different levels (molecular, individual, community, and so on), but the nature of the mechanism is gene expression and control temporally and spatially at the molecular level. In persistently changing environment, there are many adverse stress conditions such as cold, drought, salinity and UV-B (280-320 mm), which influence plant growth and crop production greatly. Plants differ from animals in many aspects, but the important may be that plants are more easily influenced by environment than animals.

Some advances in plant stress physiology and their implications in the systems biology era.

The study for biointerfaces at different scales in the past years has pricked up the march of biological sciences, in which biomembrane concept and its characteristics, receptor proteins, ion channel proteins, LEA proteins, calcium and newly recognized second messengers, ROS, MAPKs and their related sensors and new genes in osmoregulation, signal transduction, and other aspects have been understood fully, widening area of understanding the extensive interactions from biosystem and biointerfaces. The related discipline, plant stress physiology, especially, crop stress physiology has gained much attention world widely, the important reason of which is from the reducing quality of global ecoenvironment and decreasing food supply. This short review will place a stress on the recent progresses in plant stress physiology, combined with the new results from our State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau.

Molecular mechanisms of phytochrome signal transduction in higher plants.

Phytochromes in higher plants play a great role in development, responses to environmental stresses and signal transduction, which are the fundamental principles for higher plants to be adapted to changing environment. Deep and systematic understanding of the phytochrome in higher plants is of crucial importance to molecular biology, purposeful improvement of environment in practice, especially molecular mechanism by which higher plants perceive UV-B stress. The last more than 10 years have seen rapid progress in this field with the aid of a combination of molecular, genetic and cell biological approaches.