What is it about?
Light is not only a source of energy but also a regulator of plant physiological adaptations. We report now that light controls alternative cleavage/polyadenylation in approximately 30% of Arabidopsis genes. Similarly to alternative splicing, this effect requires functional chloroplasts, is not affected in photoreceptor mutants and is observed in roots only if communication with shoots is not interrupted. We identified sucrose as the signaling molecule traveling from shoots to roots and confirm that mitochondrial activity is necessary for its action in the roots. However, unlike alternative splicing, changes in transcriptional elongation are not involved. Instead, the effect correlates with chloroplast-elicited changes in the abundance of constitutive cleavage/polyadenylation factors.
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Why is it important?
Alternative polyadenylation (APA) is one of the mRNA processing mechanisms that increases the coding capacity of eukaryotic genes. The fact that this process is regulated both in the shoots and in the roots of plants when the green parts are exposed to light and that the process is initiated by the chloroplast greatly contributes to a better understanding of plant physiology.
Perspectives
For decades, my lab has contributed to understanding the regulation of alternative mRNA splicing using animal cells. More recently, the parallel exploration of mRNA processing in plants has opened new avenues and confirmed the unity of biology and that what matters in science are questions rather than restriction to single biological models.
Alberto Kornblihtt
Universidad de Buenos Aires
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Light regulates widespread plant alternative polyadenylation through the chloroplast, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, August 2024, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2405632121.
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