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Systemic regulation of sulfur homeostasis in Medicago truncatula

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Abstract

Sulfur (S) is an essential macronutrient for plants, and deficiency in soil S availability limits plant growth. Adaptive strategies have been evolved by plants to respond to S deficiency by coordinating systemic regulatory mechanism. A split-root experiment using legume model plant Medicago truncatula Gaertn. was conducted to investigate the systemic response to S deficiency. Plant growth, root morphology and S contents under varying conditions of S supply were determined, and the expression of genes encoding sulfate transporter (MtSULTRs) and MtAPR1 encoding an enzyme involved in S assimilation was monitored. Our results demonstrated that there was an apparent systemic response of M. truncatula to heterogeneous S supply in terms of root length, S contents, and S uptake and assimilation at the transcriptional level. When exposed to heterogeneous S supply, M. truncatula plants showed proliferation of lateral roots in S-rich medium and reduction in investment to S-depleted roots. Growth was stimulated with half-part of roots exposed to S-deficient medium. There were different expression patterns of MtSULTRs and MtAPR1 in response to heterogeneous S supply both in roots and shoots of M. truncatula. Expression of MtSULTR1.1 and MtSULTR1.3 was systemically responsive to S deficiency, leading to an enhancement of S uptake in roots exposed to S-sufficient medium. In addition, the response of S-deprived seedlings to re-supply of sulfate and Cys was also analyzed. It was shown that sulfate, but not Cys, may serve as a systemic signal to regulate the expression of genes associated with S absorption and assimilation in M. truncatula. These findings provide a comprehensive picture of systemic responses to S deficiency in leguminous species.

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Abbreviations

APR:

Adenosine 5′-phosphosulfate reductase

Cys:

Cysteine

GSH:

Glutathione

qRT-PCR:

Quantitative real-time PCR

S:

Sulfur

SULTR:

Sulfate transporter

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by Natural Science Foundation of China (31272234) and State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change. We thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive suggestions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100093, People’s Republic of China

    Yan Gao, Qiuying Tian & Wen-Hao Zhang

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, People’s Republic of China

    Yan Gao

  3. Research Network of Global Change Biology, Beijing Institutes of Life Science, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Wen-Hao Zhang

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  1. Yan Gao
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  2. Qiuying Tian
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Correspondence to Qiuying Tian or Wen-Hao Zhang.

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Gao, Y., Tian, Q. & Zhang, WH. Systemic regulation of sulfur homeostasis in Medicago truncatula . Planta 239, 79–96 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-013-1958-1

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