Arabidopsis non-coding RNA regulation in abiotic stress responses

Abstract

Plant growth and productivity are largely affected by environmental stresses. Therefore, plants have evolved unique adaptation mechanisms to abiotic stresses through fine-tuned adjustment of gene expression and metabolism. Recent advanced technologies, such as genome-wide transcriptome analysis, have revealed that a vast amount of non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) apart from the well-known housekeeping ncRNAs such as rRNAs, tRNAs, small nuclear RNAs (snRNAs) and small nucleolar RNAs (snoRNAs) are expressed under abiotic stress conditions. These various types of ncRNAs are involved in chromatin regulation, modulation of RNA stability and translational repression during abiotic stress response. In this review, we summarize recent progress that has been made on ncRNA research in plant abiotic stress response.

Figure 1

Regulation of ncRNAs in abiotic stress responses. ncRNAs (lncRNAs, miRNAs and siRNAs, etc.) are generated in response to abiotic stress, such as drought, low-temperature, heat and high-salinity. The ncRNAs are involved in various types of regulation, such as chromatin regulation, transcriptional regulation, RNA degradation, protection of miRNA targets, translational repression.