Arabidopsis ATG8-INTERACTING PROTEIN1 is involved in autophagy-dependent vesicular trafficking of plastid proteins to the vacuole

The Role and Regulation of Autophagy and the Proteasome During Aging and Senescence in Plants

Aging and senescence in plants has a major impact on agriculture, such as in crop yield, the value of ornamental crops, and the shelf life of vegetables and fruits. Senescence represents the final developmental phase of the leaf and inevitably results in the death of the organ. Still, the process is completely under the control of the plant. Plants use their protein degradation systems to maintain proteostasis and transport or salvage nutrients from senescing organs to develop reproductive parts. Herein, we present an overview of current knowledge about the main protein degradation pathways in plants during senescence: The proteasome and autophagy. Although both pathways degrade proteins, autophagy appears to prevent aging, while the proteasome functions as a positive regulator of senescence.

Autophagic Turnover of Chloroplasts: Its Roles and Regulatory Mechanisms in Response to Sugar Starvation

Photosynthetic reactions in chloroplasts convert atmospheric carbon dioxide into starch and soluble sugars during the day. Starch, a transient storage form of sugar, is broken down into sugars as a source for respiratory energy production at night. Chloroplasts thus serve as the main sites of sugar production for photoautotrophic plant growth. Autophagy is an evolutionarily conserved intracellular process in eukaryotes that degrades organelles and proteins. Numerous studies have shown that autophagy is actively induced in sugar-starved plants. When photosynthetic sugar production is inhibited by environmental cues, chloroplasts themselves may become an attractive alternative energy source to sugars via their degradation. Here, we summarize the process of autophagic turnover of chloroplasts and its roles in plants in response to sugar starvation. We hypothesize that piecemeal-type chloroplast autophagy is specifically activated in plants in response to sugar starvation.

Autophagy and its role in plant abiotic stress management

Being unable to move, plants are regularly exposed to changing environmental conditions, among which various types of abiotic stress, such as heat, drought, salt, and so forth. These might have deleterious effects on plant performance and yield. Plants thus need to adapt using appropriate stress responses. One of the outcomes of abiotic stress is the need to degrade and recycle damaged proteins and organelles. Autophagy is a conserved eukaryotic mechanism functioning in the degradation of proteins, protein aggregates, and whole organelles. It was previously shown to have a role in plant abiotic stress. This review will describe the current knowledge regarding the involvement of autophagy in plant abiotic stress response, mechanisms functioning in autophagy induction during stress, and possible direction for future research.

Chlorophyll catabolism precedes changes in chloroplast structure and proteome during leaf senescence

The earliest visual changes of leaf senescence occur in the chloroplast as chlorophyll is degraded and photosynthesis declines. Yet, a comprehensive understanding of the sequence of catabolic events occurring in chloroplasts during natural leaf senescence is still missing. Here, we combined confocal and electron microscopy together with proteomics and biochemistry to follow structural and molecular changes during Arabidopsis leaf senescence. We observed that initiation of chlorophyll catabolism precedes other breakdown processes. Chloroplast size, stacking of thylakoids, and efficiency of PSII remain stable until late stages of senescence, whereas the number and size of plastoglobules increase. Unlike catabolic enzymes, whose level increase, the level of most proteins decreases during senescence, and chloroplast proteins are overrepresented among these. However, the rate of their disappearance is variable, mostly uncoordinated and independent of their inherent stability during earlier developmental stages. Unexpectedly, degradation of chlorophyll-binding proteins lags behind chlorophyll catabolism. Autophagy and vacuole proteins are retained at relatively high levels, highlighting the role of extra-plastidic degradation processes especially in late stages of senescence. The observation that chlorophyll catabolism precedes all other catabolic events may suggest that this process enables or signals further catabolic processes in chloroplasts.

A facile forward-genetic screen for Arabidopsis autophagy mutants reveals twenty-one loss-of-function mutations disrupting six ATG genes

Macroautophagy is a process through which eukaryotic cells degrade large substrates including organelles, protein aggregates, and invading pathogens. Over 40 autophagy-related (ATG) genes have been identified through forward-genetic screens in yeast. Although homology-based analyses have identified conserved ATG genes in plants, only a few atg mutants have emerged from forward-genetic screens in Arabidopsis thaliana. We developed a screen that consistently recovers Arabidopsis atg mutations by exploiting mutants with defective LON2/At5g47040, a protease implicated in peroxisomal quality control. Arabidopsis lon2 mutants exhibit reduced responsiveness to the peroxisomally-metabolized auxin precursor indole-3-butyric acid (IBA), heightened degradation of several peroxisomal matrix proteins, and impaired processing of proteins harboring N-terminal peroxisomal targeting signals; these defects are ameliorated by preventing autophagy. We optimized a lon2 suppressor screen to expedite recovery of additional atg mutants. After screening mutagenized lon2-2 seedlings for restored IBA responsiveness, we evaluated stabilization and processing of peroxisomal proteins, levels of several ATG proteins, and levels of the selective autophagy receptor NBR1/At4g24690, which accumulates when autophagy is impaired. We recovered 21 alleles disrupting 6 ATG genes: ATG2/At3g19190, ATG3/At5g61500, ATG5/At5g17290, ATG7/At5g45900, ATG16/At5g50230, and ATG18a/At3g62770. Twenty alleles were novel, and 3 of the mutated genes lack T-DNA insertional alleles in publicly available repositories. We also demonstrate that an insertional atg11/At4g30790 allele incompletely suppresses lon2 defects. Finally, we show that NBR1 is not necessary for autophagy of lon2 peroxisomes and that NBR1 overexpression is not sufficient to trigger autophagy of seedling peroxisomes, indicating that Arabidopsis can use an NBR1-independent mechanism to target peroxisomes for autophagic degradation.

Abbreviations: ATG: autophagy-related; ATI: ATG8-interacting protein; Col-0: Columbia-0; DSK2: dominant suppressor of KAR2; EMS: ethyl methanesulfonate; GFP: green fluorescent protein; IAA: indole-3-acetic acid; IBA: indole-3-butyric acid; ICL: isocitrate lyase; MLS: malate synthase; NBR1: Next to BRCA1 gene 1; PEX: peroxin; PMDH: peroxisomal malate dehydrogenase; PTS: peroxisomal targeting signal; thiolase: 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase; UBA: ubiquitin-associated; WT: wild type

The transmembrane autophagy cargo receptors ATI1 and ATI2 interact with ATG8 through intrinsically disordered regions with distinct biophysical properties

Selective autophagy has emerged as an important mechanism by which eukaryotic cells control the abundance of specific proteins. This mechanism relies on cargo recruitment to autophagosomes by receptors that bind to both the ubiquitin-like AUTOPHAGY8 (ATG8) protein through ATG8-interacting motifs (AIMs) and to the cargo to be degraded. In plants, two autophagy cargo receptors, ATG8-interacting protein 1 (ATI1) and 2 (ATI2), were identified early on, but their molecular properties remain poorly understood. Here, we show that ATI1 and ATI2 are transmembrane proteins with long N-terminal intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs). The N-terminal IDRs contain the functional AIMs, and we use nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy to directly observe the disorder-order transition of the AIM upon ATG8 binding. Our analyses also show that the IDRs of ATI1 and ATI2 are not equivalent, because ATI2 has properties of a fully disordered polypeptide, while ATI1 has properties more consistent with a collapsed pre-molten globule-like conformation, possibly as a consequence of a higher content of π-orbital-containing amino acid residues. Finally, we show that a sizable fraction of ATI2, but not ATI1, is phosphorylated in planta.

AQUA1 is a mercury sensitive poplar aquaporin regulated at transcriptional and post-translational levels by Zn stress

Aquaporins are water channel proteins that regulate plant development, growth, and response to environmental stresses. Populus trichocarpa is one of the plants with the highest number of aquaporins in its genome, but only few of them have been characterized at the whole plant functional level. Here we analyzed a putative aquaporin gene, aqua1, a gene that encodes for a protein of 257 amino acid with the typical NPA (Asp-Pro-Ala) signature motif of the aquaporin gene family. aqua1 was down-regulated of ∼10 fold under excess Zn in both leaves and roots, and conferred Zn tolerance when expressed in yeast Zn hypersensitive strain. In vivo localization of AQUA1-GFP in Arabidopsis protoplast showed a heterogeneous distribution of this protein on different membranes destined to form aggregates related to autophagic multivesicular bodies. Zn-dependent AQUA1-GFP re-localization was perturbed by phosphatases' and kinases' inhibitors that could affect both intracellular trafficking and aquaporins' activity. Exposed to high concentration of Zn, AQUA1 also co-localized with AtTIP1;1, a well-known Arabidopsis vacuolar marker, probably in pro-vacuolar multivesicular bodies. These findings suggest that high concentration of Zn down-regulates aqua1 and causes its re-localization in new forming pro-vacuoles. This Zn-dependent re-localization appears to be mediated by mechanisms regulating intracellular trafficking and aquaporins' post-translational modifications. This functional characterization of a poplar aquaporin in response to excess Zn will be a useful reference for understanding aquaporins' roles and regulation in response to high concentration of Zn in poplar.

Marchantia polymorpha, a New Model Plant for Autophagy Studies

Autophagy is a catabolic process for bulk and selective degradation of cytoplasmic components in the vacuole/lysosome. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, ATG genes were identified as essential genes for autophagy, and most ATG genes are highly conserved among eukaryotes, including plants. Although reverse genetic analyses have revealed that autophagy is involved in responses to abiotic and biotic stresses in land plants, our knowledge of its molecular mechanism remains limited. This limitation is partly because of the multiplication of some ATG genes, including ATG8, in widely used model plants such as Arabidopsis thaliana, which adds complexity to functional studies. Furthermore, due to limited information on the composition and functions of the ATG genes in basal land plants and charophytes, it remains unclear whether multiplication of ATG genes is associated with neofunctionalization of these genes. To gain insight into the diversification of ATG genes during plant evolution, we compared the composition of ATG genes in plants with a special focus on a liverwort and two charophytes, which have not previously been analyzed. Our results showed that the liverwort Marchantia polymorpha and the charophytes Klebsormidium nitens and Chara braunii harbor fundamental sets of ATG genes with low redundancy compared with those of A. thaliana and the moss Physcomitrella patens, suggesting that multiplication of ATG genes occurred during land plant evolution. We also attempted to establish an experimental system for analyzing autophagy in M. polymorpha. We generated transgenic plants expressing fluorescently tagged MpATG8 to observe its dynamics in M. polymorpha and produced autophagy-defective mutants by genome editing using the CRISPR/Cas9 system. These tools allowed us to demonstrate that MpATG8 is transported into the vacuole in an MpATG2-, MpATG5-, and MpATG7-dependent manner, suggesting that fluorescently tagged MpATG8 can be used as an autophagosome marker in M. polymorpha. M. polymorpha can provide a powerful system for studying the mechanisms and evolution of autophagy in plants.

Targeted Control of Chloroplast Quality to Improve Plant Acclimation: From Protein Import to Degradation

The chloroplast is an important energy-producing organelle acting as an environmental sensor for the plant cell. The normal turnover of the entire damaged chloroplast and its specific components is required for efficient photosynthesis and other metabolic reactions under stress conditions. Nuclear-encoded proteins must be imported into the chloroplast through different membrane transport complexes, and the orderly protein import plays an important role in plant adaptive regulation. Under adverse environmental conditions, the damaged chloroplast or its specific components need to be degraded efficiently to ensure normal cell function. In this review, we discuss the molecular mechanism of protein import and degradation in the chloroplast. Specifically, quality control of chloroplast from protein import to degradation and associated regulatory pathways are discussed to better understand how plants adapt to environmental stress by fine-tuning chloroplast homeostasis, which will benefit breeding approaches to improve crop yield.

Chloroplast Degradation: Multiple Routes Into the Vacuole

Chloroplasts provide energy for all plants by producing sugar during photosynthesis. To adapt to various environmental and developmental cues, plants have developed specific strategies to control chloroplast homeostasis in plant cells, including chloroplast degradation during leaf senescence and the transition of chloroplasts into other types of plastids during the day-night cycle. In recent years, autophagy has emerged as an essential mechanism for selective degradation of chloroplast materials (also known as chlorophagy) in the vacuole. Different types of membrane structures have been implicated to involve in the delivery of distinct chloroplast contents. Here we provide a current overview on chlorophagy and discuss the possible chloroplast receptors and upstream signals in this process.

Plant autophagy: new flavors on the menu

Autophagy mediates the delivery of cytoplasmic content to vacuoles or lysosomes for degradation or storage. The best characterized autophagy route called macroautophagy involves the sequestration of cargo in double-membrane autophagosomes and is conserved in eukaryotes, including plants. Recently, several new receptors, some of them plant-specific, that select cargo for macroautophagy have been identified. Some of these receptors appear to participate in regulation of competing catabolic pathways, for example proteasome-mediated versus autophagic degradation under specific stress conditions. Vacuolar microautophagy, a process by which the vacuole directly engulf cytoplasmic material, also occurs in plants but its underlying molecular mechanisms are yet to be elucidated.

Maize multi-omics reveal roles for autophagic recycling in proteome remodelling and lipid turnover

The turnover of cytoplasmic material by autophagic encapsulation and delivery to vacuoles is essential for recycling cellular constituents, especially under nutrient-limiting conditions. To determine how cells/tissues rely on autophagy, we applied in-depth multi-omic analyses to study maize (Zea mays) autophagy mutants grown under nitrogen-replete and -starvation conditions. Broad alterations in the leaf metabolome were evident in plants missing the core autophagy component ATG12, even in the absence of stress, particularly affecting products of lipid turnover and secondary metabolites, which were underpinned by substantial changes in the transcriptome and/or proteome. Cross-comparison of messenger RNA and protein abundances allowed for the identification of organelles, protein complexes and individual proteins targeted for selective autophagic clearance, and revealed several processes controlled by this catabolism. Collectively, we describe a facile multi-omic strategy to survey autophagic substrates, and show that autophagy has a remarkable influence in sculpting eukaryotic proteomes and membranes both before and during nutrient stress.

Autophagosome Biogenesis and the Endoplasmic Reticulum: A Plant Perspective

The autophagosome is a double-membrane compartment formed during autophagy that sequesters and delivers cargoes for their degradation or recycling into the vacuole. Analyses of the AuTophaGy-related (ATG) proteins have unveiled dynamic mechanisms for autophagosome biogenesis. Recent advances in plant autophagy research highlight a complex interplay between autophagosome biogenesis and the endoplasmic reticulum (ER): on the one hand ER serves as a membrane source for autophagosome initiation and a signaling platform for autophagy regulation; on the other hand ER turnover is connected to selective autophagy. We provide here an integrated view of ER-based autophagosome biogenesis in plants in comparison with the newest findings in yeast and mammals, with an emphasis on the hierarchy of the core ATG proteins, ATG9 trafficking, and ER-resident regulators in autophagy.

Selective Elimination of Membrane-Damaged Chloroplasts via Microautophagy

Plant chloroplasts constantly accumulate damage caused by visible wavelengths of light during photosynthesis. Our previous study revealed that entire photodamaged chloroplasts are subjected to vacuolar digestion through an autophagy process termed chlorophagy; however, how this process is induced and executed remained poorly understood. In this study, we monitored intracellular induction of chlorophagy in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) leaves and found that mesophyll cells damaged by high visible light displayed abnormal chloroplasts with a swollen shape and 2.5 times the volume of normal chloroplasts. In wild-type plants, the activation of chlorophagy decreased the number of swollen chloroplasts. In the autophagy-deficient autophagy mutants, the swollen chloroplasts persisted, and dysfunctional chloroplasts that had lost chlorophyll fluorescence accumulated in the cytoplasm. Chloroplast swelling and subsequent induction of chlorophagy were suppressed by the application of exogenous mannitol to increase the osmotic pressure outside chloroplasts or by overexpression of VESICLE INDUCING PROTEIN IN PLASTID1, which maintains chloroplast envelope integrity. Microscopic observations of autophagy-related membranes showed that swollen chloroplasts were partly surrounded by autophagosomal structures and were engulfed directly by the tonoplast, as in microautophagy. Our results indicate that an elevation in osmotic potential inside the chloroplast due to high visible light-derived envelope damage results in chloroplast swelling and serves as an induction factor for chlorophagy, and this process mobilizes entire chloroplasts via tonoplast-mediated sequestering to avoid the cytosolic accumulation of dysfunctional chloroplasts.

S-Nitrosylation Targets GSNO Reductase for Selective Autophagy during Hypoxia Responses in Plants

Nitric oxide (NO) regulates diverse cellular signaling through S-nitrosylation of specific Cys residues of target proteins. The intracellular level of S-nitrosoglutathione (GSNO), a major bioactive NO species, is regulated by GSNO reductase (GSNOR), a highly conserved master regulator of NO signaling. However, little is known about how the activity of GSNOR is regulated. Here, we show that S-nitrosylation induces selective autophagy of Arabidopsis GSNOR1 during hypoxia responses. S-nitrosylation of GSNOR1 at Cys-10 induces conformational changes, exposing its AUTOPHAGY-RELATED8 (ATG8)-interacting motif (AIM) accessible by autophagy machinery. Upon binding by ATG8, GSNOR1 is recruited into the autophagosome and degraded in an AIM-dependent manner. Physiologically, the S-nitrosylation-induced selective autophagy of GSNOR1 is relevant to hypoxia responses. Our discovery reveals a unique mechanism by which S-nitrosylation mediates selective autophagy of GSNOR1, thereby establishing a molecular link between NO signaling and autophagy.

Regulation of Chlorophagy during Photoinhibition and Senescence: Lessons from Mitophagy

Light energy is essential for photosynthetic energy production and plant growth. Chloroplasts in green tissues convert energy from sunlight into chemical energy via the electron transport chain. When the level of light energy exceeds the capacity of the photosynthetic apparatus, chloroplasts undergo a process known as photoinhibition. Since photoinhibition leads to the overaccumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and the spreading of cell death, plants have developed multiple systems to protect chloroplasts from strong light. Recent studies have shown that autophagy, a system that functions in eukaryotes for the intracellular degradation of cytoplasmic components, participates in the removal of damaged chloroplasts. Previous findings also demonstrated an important role for autophagy in chloroplast turnover during leaf senescence. In this review, we describe the turnover of whole chloroplasts, which occurs via a type of autophagy termed chlorophagy. We discuss a possible regulatory mechanism for the induction of chlorophagy based on current knowledge of photoinhibition, leaf senescence and mitophagy-the autophagic turnover of mitochondria in yeast and mammals.

Autophagy: The Master of Bulk and Selective Recycling

Plants have evolved sophisticated mechanisms to recycle intracellular constituents, which are essential for developmental and metabolic transitions; for efficient nutrient reuse; and for the proper disposal of proteins, protein complexes, and even entire organelles that become obsolete or dysfunctional. One major route is autophagy, which employs specialized vesicles to encapsulate and deliver cytoplasmic material to the vacuole for breakdown. In the past decade, the mechanics of autophagy and the scores of components involved in autophagic vesicle assembly have been documented. Now emerging is the importance of dedicated receptors that help recruit appropriate cargo, which in many cases exploit ubiquitylation as a signal. Although operating at a low constitutive level in all plant cells, autophagy is upregulated during senescence and various environmental challenges and is essential for proper nutrient allocation. Its importance to plant metabolism and energy balance in particular places autophagy at the nexus of robust crop performance, especially under suboptimal conditions.

Autophagy-related approaches for improving nutrient use efficiency and crop yield protection

Autophagy is a eukaryotic catabolic pathway essential for growth and development. In plants, it is activated in response to environmental cues or developmental stimuli. However, in contrast to other eukaryotic systems, we know relatively little regarding the molecular players involved in autophagy and the regulation of this complex pathway. In the framework of the COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) action TRANSAUTOPHAGY (2016-2020), we decided to review our current knowledge of autophagy responses in higher plants, with emphasis on knowledge gaps. We also assess here the potential of translating the acquired knowledge to improve crop plant growth and development in a context of growing social and environmental challenges for agriculture in the near future.

Chloroplast Protein Turnover: The Influence of Extraplastidic Processes, Including Autophagy

Most assimilated nutrients in the leaves of land plants are stored in chloroplasts as photosynthetic proteins, where they mediate CO₂ assimilation during growth. During senescence or under suboptimal conditions, chloroplast proteins are degraded, and the amino acids released during this process are used to produce young tissues, seeds, or respiratory energy. Protein degradation machineries contribute to the quality control of chloroplasts by removing damaged proteins caused by excess energy from sunlight. Whereas previous studies revealed that chloroplasts contain several types of intraplastidic proteases that likely derived from an endosymbiosed prokaryotic ancestor of chloroplasts, recent reports have demonstrated that multiple extraplastidic pathways also contribute to chloroplast protein turnover in response to specific cues. One such pathway is autophagy, an evolutionarily conserved process that leads to the vacuolar or lysosomal degradation of cytoplasmic components in eukaryotic cells. Here, we describe and contrast the extraplastidic pathways that degrade chloroplasts. This review shows that diverse pathways participate in chloroplast turnover during sugar starvation, senescence, and oxidative stress. Elucidating the mechanisms that regulate these pathways will help decipher the relationship among the diverse pathways mediating chloroplast protein turnover.

Dicot-specific ATG8-interacting ATI3 proteins interact with conserved UBAC2 proteins and play critical roles in plant stress responses

Selective macroautophagy/autophagy targets specific cargo by autophagy receptors through interaction with ATG8 (autophagy-related protein 8)/MAP1LC3 (microtubule associated protein 1 light chain 3) for degradation in the vacuole. Here, we report the identification and characterization of 3 related ATG8-interacting proteins (AT1G17780/ATI3A, AT2G16575/ATI3B and AT1G73130/ATI3C) from Arabidopsis. ATI3 proteins contain a WxxL LC3-interacting region (LIR) motif at the C terminus required for interaction with ATG8. ATI3 homologs are found only in dicots but not in other organisms including monocots. Disruption of ATI3A does not alter plant growth or development but compromises both plant heat tolerance and resistance to the necrotrophic fungal pathogen Botrytis cinerea. The critical role of ATI3A in plant stress tolerance and disease resistance is dependent on its interaction with ATG8. Disruption of ATI3B and ATI3C also significantly compromises plant heat tolerance. ATI3A interacts with AT3G56740/UBAC2A and AT2G41160/UBAC2B (Ubiquitin-associated [UBA] protein 2a/b), 2 conserved proteins implicated in endoplasmic reticulum (ER)-associated degradation. Disruption of UBAC2A and UBAC2B also compromised heat tolerance and resistance to B. cinerea. Overexpression of UBAC2 induces formation of ATG8- and ATI3-labeled punctate structures under normal conditions, likely reflecting increased formation of phagophores or autophagosomes. The ati3 and ubac2 mutants are significantly compromised in sensitivity to tunicamycin, an ER stress-inducing agent, but are fully competent in autophagy-dependent ER degradation under conditions of ER stress when using an ER lumenal marker for detection. We propose that ATI3 and UBAC2 play an important role in plant stress responses by mediating selective autophagy of specific unknown ER components.

Vacuolar degradation of chloroplast components: autophagy and beyond

Chloroplast degradation during natural or stress-induced senescence requires the participation of both plastidic and extraplastidic degradative pathways. As part of the extraplastidic pathways, chloroplasts export stroma, envelope, and thylakoid proteins in membrane-bound organelles that are ultimately degraded in vacuoles. Some of these pathways, such as the formation of senescence-associated vacuoles (SAVs) and CV-containing vesicles (CCVs), do not depend on autophagy, whereas delivery of Rubisco-containing bodies (RCBs), ATI1-PS (ATG8-interacting Protein 1) bodies, and small starch-like granule (SSLG) bodies is autophagy dependent. In addition, autophagy of entire chloroplasts delivers damaged chloroplasts into the vacuolar lumen for degradation. This review summarizes the autophagy-dependent and independent trafficking mechanisms by which plant cells degrade chloroplast components in vacuoles.

Stress-induced senescence and plant tolerance to abiotic stress

Senescence is an age-dependent process, ultimately leading to plant death, that in annual crop plants overlaps with the reproductive stage of development. Research on the molecular and biochemical mechanisms of leaf senescence has revealed a multi-layered regulatory network operating to control age-dependent processes. Abiotic stress-induced senescence challenges source-sink relationships and results in significant reduction in crop yields. Although processes associated with plant senescence are well studied, the mechanisms regulating stress-induced senescence are not well known. Here, we discuss the effects of abiotic stress on crop productivity, mechanisms associated with stress-induced senescence, and the possible use of these mechanisms for the generation of plant stress tolerance. We emphasize the involvement of source strength and stability of the photosynthetic apparatus in this process, and suggest a possible role of a perennial plant life strategy for the amelioration of stress-induced senescence.

Divergent N Deficiency-Dependent Senescence and Transcriptome Response in Developmentally Old and Young Brassica napus Leaves

In the spring oilseed rape (OSR) cultivar 'Mozart' grown under optimal N supply (NO) or mild N deficiency (NL) the transcriptome changes associated with progressing age until early senescence in developmentally old lower canopy leaves (leaf #4) and younger higher canopy leaves (leaf #8) were investigated. Twelve weeks old NO and NL plants appeared phenotypically and transcriptomically identical, but thereafter distinct nutrition-dependent differences in gene expression patterns in lower and upper canopy leaves emerged. In NO leaves #4 of 14-week-old compared to 13-week-old plants, ∼600 genes were up- or downregulated, whereas in NL leaves #4 ∼3000 genes were up- or downregulated. In contrast, in 15-week-old compared to 13-week-old upper canopy leaves #8 more genes were up- or downregulated in optimally N-supplied plants (∼2000 genes) than in N-depleted plants (∼750 genes). This opposing effect of N depletion on gene regulation was even more prominent among photosynthesis-related genes (PSGs). Between week 13 and 14 in leaves #4, 99 of 110 PSGs were downregulated in NL plants, but none in NO plants. In contrast, from weeks 13 to 16 in leaves #8 of NL plants only 11 PSGs were downregulated in comparison to 66 PSGs in NO plants. Different effects of N depletion in lower versus upper canopy leaves were also apparent in upregulation of autophagy genes and NAC transcription factors. More than half of the regulated NAC and WRKY transcription factor, autophagy and protease genes were specifically regulated in NL leaves #4 or NO leaves #8 and thus may contribute to differences in senescence and nutrient mobilization in these leaves. We suggest that in N-deficient plants the upper leaves retain their N resources longer than in amply fertilized plants and remobilize them only after shedding of the lower leaves.

Dynamics of Autophagosome Formation

Environmental stress activates autophagy and leads to autophagosome formation at the endoplasmic reticulum.

HSP90C interacts with PsbO1 and facilitates its thylakoid distribution from chloroplast stroma in Arabidopsis

Arabidopsis plastidic HSP90C is an HSP90 family molecular chaperone that is required for chloroplast development and function. To understand the mechanism of action of HSP90C within the chloroplast, we conducted a yeast two-hybrid screening and revealed it interacts directly with the photosystem II extrinsic protein PsbO1, which performs a canonical function in the thylakoid lumen. To understand the biological significance of HSP90C-PsbO1 interaction, we investigated the role of HSP90C in modulating the stromal and thylakoid distribution of PsbO1GFP fusion protein. Fusion to GFP significantly delays the PsbO1 thylakoid transport and induces a variegation phenotype. Overexpression of HSP90C promotes the thylakoid distribution of PsbO1GFP and alleviates the leaf variegation. By tracking the chloroplast maturation during photomorphogenesis, we observed PsbO1GFP tends to form distinct fluorescent clusters within the stroma with delayed thylakoid membrane biogenesis, while HSP90C overexpression corrects these adverse effects. We also demonstrated that active HSP90C function is specifically required for stable accumulation of mature PsbO1GFP in thylakoid by using specific inhibitor geldanamycin. This study therefore not only identified novel HSP90C interactors, but also reports for the first time that PsbO1 enroute from the cytoplasm to thylakoid lumen is tightly regulated by the HSP90C chaperone complex in plastid stroma; whereas the proper HSP90C homeostasis is also critical for chloroplast maturation and function.

Chloroplast signaling and quality control

Although chloroplasts contain their own genetic system and are semi-autonomous cell organelles, plastid biogenesis and homeostasis are heavily dependent on the nucleo-cytosolic compartment. These two cellular compartments are closely co-ordinated through a complex signaling network comprising both anterograde and retrograde signaling chains. Developmental changes or any perturbation in the chloroplast system induced by a particular stress resulting from changes in environmental conditions such as excess light, elevated temperature, nutrient limitation, pathogen infection, give rise to specific signals. They migrate out of the chloroplast and are perceived by the nucleus where they elicit changes in expression of particular genes that allow for the maintenance of plastid homeostasis toward environmental cues. These genes mainly include those of photosynthesis-associated proteins, chaperones, proteases, nucleases and immune/defense proteins. Besides this transcriptional response, a chloroplast quality control system exists that is involved in the repair and turnover of damaged plastid proteins. This system degrades aggregated or damaged proteins and it can even remove entire chloroplasts when they have suffered heavy damage. This response comprises several processes such as plastid autophagy and ubiquitin–proteasome mediated proteolysis that occurs on the plastid envelope through the action of the ubiquitin–proteasome system.

Understanding and exploiting autophagy signaling in plants

Autophagy is an essential catabolic pathway and is activated by various endogenous and exogenous stimuli. In particular, autophagy is required to allow sessile organisms such as plants to cope with biotic or abiotic stress conditions. It is thought that these various environmental signaling pathways are somehow integrated with autophagy signaling. However, the molecular mechanisms of plant autophagy signaling are not well understood, leaving a big gap of knowledge as a barrier to being able to manipulate this important pathway to improve plant growth and development. In this review, we discuss possible regulatory mechanisms at the core of plant autophagy signaling.

Partial or entire: Distinct responses of two types of chloroplast autophagy

Autophagy carries out intracellular degradation of cytoplasmic components, which is important for the removal of dysfunctional organelles and for efficient nutrient recycling in eukaryotic cells. Most proteins in plant green tissues are found in chloroplasts, mainly as photosynthetic proteins that constantly accumulate damage caused by sunlight. Our recent study investigated the involvement of autophagy in the turnover of damaged chloroplasts and found that entire photodamaged chloroplasts are transported into the vacuole for degradation via an autophagy process termed chlorophagy. Our previous studies also established that autophagy can also degrade chloroplast components piecemeal: chloroplast stroma is transported for degradation via autophagy vesicles termed Rubisco-containing bodies (RCB). During sugar starvation-induced senescence in darkened leaves, the RCB pathway is preferentially active. By contrast, we observed active chlorophagy without prior induction of RCB production in photodamaged leaves. These distinct responses between the RCB pathway and chlorophagy support the notion that the induction of the partial-type and entire-organelle-type chloroplast autophagy are differentially regulated by individual upstream molecules. This finding further suggests that the two types of autophagy are coordinated to achieve the controlled chloroplast turnover in response to specific conditions.

Plant ESCRT Complexes: Moving Beyond Endosomal Sorting

The endosomal sorting complex required for transport (ESCRT) machinery is an ancient system that deforms membrane and severs membrane necks from the inside. Extensive evidence has accumulated to demonstrate the conserved functions of plant ESCRTs in multivesicular body (MVB) biogenesis and MVB-mediated membrane protein sorting. In addition, recent exciting findings have uncovered unique plant ESCRT components and point to emerging roles for plant ESCRTs in non-endosomal sorting events such as autophagy, cytokinesis, and viral replication. Plant-specific processes, such as abscisic acid (ABA) signaling and chloroplast turnover, provide further evidence for divergences in the functions of plant ESCRTs during evolution. We summarize the multiple roles and current working models for plant ESCRT machinery and speculate on future ESCRT studies in the plant field.

Regulation of nutrient recycling via autophagy

Autophagy is a universal mechanism in eukaryotes that promotes cell longevity and nutrient recycling through the degradation of unwanted organelles, proteins and damaged cytoplasmic compounds. Autophagy is important in plant resistance to stresses and starvations and in remobilization. Autophagy facilitates bulk and selective degradations, through the delivery of cell material to the vacuole where hydrolases and proteases reside. Large metabolite modifications are observed in autophagy mutants showing the important role of autophagy in cell homeostasis. The control of autophagic activity by nutrients and energy status is supported by several studies in plant and animal. We review how autophagy contributes to nutrient management in plants and how nutrient status control this degradation pathway for adaptation to the environment.

Autophagy Deficiency Compromises Alternative Pathways of Respiration following Energy Deprivation in Arabidopsis thaliana

Under heterotrophic conditions, carbohydrate oxidation inside the mitochondrion is the primary energy source for cellular metabolism. However, during energy-limited conditions, alternative substrates are required to support respiration. Amino acid oxidation in plant cells plays a key role in this by generating electrons that can be transferred to the mitochondrial electron transport chain via the electron transfer flavoprotein/ubiquinone oxidoreductase system. Autophagy, a catabolic mechanism for macromolecule and protein recycling, allows the maintenance of amino acid pools and nutrient remobilization. Although the association between autophagy and alternative respiratory substrates has been suggested, the extent to which autophagy and primary metabolism interact to support plant respiration remains unclear. To investigate the metabolic importance of autophagy during development and under extended darkness, Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) mutants with disruption of autophagy (atg mutants) were used. Under normal growth conditions, atg mutants showed lower growth and seed production with no impact on photosynthesis. Following extended darkness, atg mutants were characterized by signatures of early senescence, including decreased chlorophyll content and maximum photochemical efficiency of photosystem II coupled with increases in dark respiration. Transcript levels of genes involved in alternative pathways of respiration and amino acid catabolism were up-regulated in atg mutants. The metabolite profiles of dark-treated leaves revealed an extensive metabolic reprogramming in which increases in amino acid levels were partially compromised in atg mutants. Although an enhanced respiration in atg mutants was observed during extended darkness, autophagy deficiency compromises protein degradation and the generation of amino acids used as alternative substrates to the respiration.

Cysteine proteases and wheat (Triticum aestivum L) under drought: A still greatly unexplored association

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) provides about 19% of global dietary energy. Environmental stress, such as drought, affects wheat growth causing premature plant senescence and ultimately plant death. A plant response to drought is an increase in protease-mediated proteolysis with rapid degradation of proteins required for metabolic processes. Among the plant proteases that are increased in their activity following stress, cysteine proteases are the best characterized. Very little is known about particular wheat cysteine protease sequences, their expression and also localization. The current knowledge on wheat cysteine proteases belonging to the five clans (CA, CD, CE, CF and CP) is outlined, in particular their expression and possible function under drought. The first successes in establishing an annotated wheat genome database are further highlighted which has allowed more detailed mining of cysteine proteases. We also share our thoughts on future research directions considering the growing availability of genomic resources of this very important food crop. Finally, we also outline future application of developed knowledge in transgenic wheat plants for environmental stress protection and also as senescence markers to monitor wheat growth under environmental stress conditions.

New advances in autophagy in plants: Regulation, selectivity and function

Autophagy is a major and conserved pathway for delivering unwanted proteins or damaged organelles to the vacuole for degradation and recycling. In plants, it functions as a housekeeping process to maintain cellular homeostasis under normal conditions and is induced by stress and senescence; it thus plays important roles in development, stress tolerance and metabolism. Autophagy can both execute bulk degradation and be highly selective in targeting cargos under specific environmental conditions or during certain developmental processes. Here, we review recent research on autophagy in plants, and discuss new insights into its core mechanism, regulation, selectivity and physiological roles. Potential future directions are also highlighted.

To deliver or to degrade - an interplay of the ubiquitin-proteasome system, autophagy and vesicular transport in plants

The efficient utilization and subsequent reuse of cell components is a key factor in determining the proper growth and functioning of all cells under both optimum and stress conditions. The process of intracellular and intercellular recycling is especially important for the appropriate control of cellular metabolism and nutrient management in immobile organisms, such as plants. Therefore, the accurate recycling of amino acids, lipids, carbohydrates or micro- and macronutrients available in the plant cell becomes a critical factor that ensures plant survival and growth. Plant cells possess two main degradation mechanisms: a ubiquitin-proteasome system and autophagy, which, as a part of an intracellular trafficking system, is based on vesicle transport. This review summarizes knowledge of both the ubiquitin-proteasome system and autophagy pathways, describes the cross-talk between the two and discusses the relationships between autophagy and the vesicular transport systems.

Nitrogen remobilization during leaf senescence: lessons from Arabidopsis to crops

As a result of climate changes, land use and agriculture have to adapt to new demands. Agriculture is responsible for a large part of the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that have to be urgently reduced in order to protect the environment. At the same time, agriculture has to cope with the challenges of sustainably feeding a growing world population. Reducing the use of the ammonia-nitrate fertilizers that are responsible for a large part of the GHGs released and that have a negative impact on carbon balance is one of the objectives of precision agriculture. One way to reduce N fertilizers without dramatically affecting grain yields is to improve the nitrogen recycling and remobilization performances of plants. Mechanisms involved in nitrogen recycling, such as autophagy, are essential for nutrient remobilization at the whole-plant level and for seed quality. Studies on leaf senescence and nutrient recycling provide new perspectives for improvement. The aim of this review is to give an overview of the mechanisms involved in nitrogen recycling and remobilization during leaf senescence and to present the different approaches undertaken to improve nitrogen remobilization efficiency using both model plants and crop species.

The Life and Death of a Plant Cell

Like all eukaryotic organisms, plants possess an innate program for controlled cellular demise termed programmed cell death (PCD). Despite the functional conservation of PCD across broad evolutionary distances, an understanding of the molecular machinery underpinning this fundamental program in plants remains largely elusive. As in mammalian PCD, the regulation of plant PCD is critical to development, homeostasis, and proper responses to stress. Evidence is emerging that autophagy is key to the regulation of PCD in plants and that it can dictate the outcomes of PCD execution under various scenarios. Here, we provide a broad and comparative overview of PCD processes in plants, with an emphasis on stress-induced PCD. We also discuss the implications of the paradox that is functional conservation of apoptotic hallmarks in plants in the absence of core mammalian apoptosis regulators, what that means, and whether an equivalent form of death occurs in plants.

Entire Photodamaged Chloroplasts Are Transported to the Central Vacuole by Autophagy

Turnover of dysfunctional organelles is vital to maintain homeostasis in eukaryotic cells. As photosynthetic organelles, plant chloroplasts can suffer sunlight-induced damage. However, the process for turnover of entire damaged chloroplasts remains unclear. Here, we demonstrate that autophagy is responsible for the elimination of sunlight-damaged, collapsed chloroplasts in Arabidopsis thaliana We found that vacuolar transport of entire chloroplasts, termed chlorophagy, was induced by UV-B damage to the chloroplast apparatus. This transport did not occur in autophagy-defective atg mutants, which exhibited UV-B-sensitive phenotypes and accumulated collapsed chloroplasts. Use of a fluorescent protein marker of the autophagosomal membrane allowed us to image autophagosome-mediated transport of entire chloroplasts to the central vacuole. In contrast to sugar starvation, which preferentially induced distinct type of chloroplast-targeted autophagy that transports a part of stroma via the Rubisco-containing body (RCB) pathway, photooxidative damage induced chlorophagy without prior activation of RCB production. We further showed that chlorophagy is induced by chloroplast damage caused by either artificial visible light or natural sunlight. Thus, this report establishes that an autophagic process eliminates entire chloroplasts in response to light-induced damage.

ATG9 regulates autophagosome progression from the endoplasmic reticulum in Arabidopsis

Autophagy is a conserved pathway for bulk degradation of cytoplasmic material by a double-membrane structure named the autophagosome. The initiation of autophagosome formation requires the recruitment of autophagy-related protein 9 (ATG9) vesicles to the preautophagosomal structure. However, the functional relationship between ATG9 vesicles and the phagophore is controversial in different systems, and the molecular function of ATG9 remains unknown in plants. Here, we demonstrate that ATG9 is essential for endoplasmic reticulum (ER)-derived autophagosome formation in plants. Through a combination of genetic, in vivo imaging and electron tomography approaches, we show that Arabidopsis ATG9 deficiency leads to a drastic accumulation of autophagosome-related tubular structures in direct membrane continuity with the ER upon autophagic induction. Dynamic analyses demonstrate a transient membrane association between ATG9 vesicles and the autophagosomal membrane during autophagy. Furthermore, trafficking of ATG18a is compromised in atg9 mutants during autophagy by forming extended tubules in a phosphatidylinositol 3-phosphate-dependent manner. Taken together, this study provides evidence for a pivotal role of ATG9 in regulating autophagosome progression from the ER membrane in Arabidopsis.

Visualisation of plastid degradation in sperm cells of wheat pollen

Like most angiosperms, wheat (Triticum aestivum) shows maternal inheritance of plastids. It is thought that this takes place by cytoplasmic stripping at fertilisation rather than the absence of plastids in sperm cells. To determine the fate of plastids during sperm cell development, plastid-targeted green fluorescent protein was used to visualise these organelles in nuclear transgenic wheat lines. Fewer than thirty small 1-2-μm plastids were visible in early uninucleate pollen cells. These dramatically increased to several hundred larger (4 μm) plastids during pollen maturation and went through distinct morphological changes. Only small plastids were visible in generative cells (n = 25) and young sperm cells (n = 9). In mature sperm cells, these green fluorescent protein (GFP)-tagged plastids were absent. This is consistent with maternal inheritance of plastids resulting from their degradation in mature sperm cells in wheat.

Autophagy Is Rapidly Induced by Salt Stress and Is Required for Salt Tolerance in Arabidopsis

Salinity stress challenges agriculture and food security globally. Upon salt stress, plant growth slows down, nutrients are recycled, osmolytes are produced, and reallocation of Na⁺ takes place. Since autophagy is a high-throughput degradation pathway that contributes to nutrient remobilization in plants, we explored the involvement of autophagic flux in salt stress response of Arabidopsis with various approaches. Confocal microscopy of GFP-ATG8a in transgenic Arabidopsis showed that autophagosome formation is induced shortly after salt treatment. Immunoblotting of ATG8s and the autophagy receptor NBR1 confirmed that the level of autophagy peaks within 30 min of salt stress, and then settles to a new homeostasis in Arabidopsis. Such an induction is absent in mutants defective in autophagy. Within 3 h of salt treatment, accumulation of oxidized proteins is alleviated in the wild-type; however, such a reduction is not seen in atg2 or atg7. Consistently, the Arabidopsis atg mutants are hypersensitive to both salt and osmotic stresses, and plants overexpressing ATG8 perform better than the wild-type in germination assays. Quantification of compatible osmolytes further confirmed that the autophagic flux contributes to salt stress adaptation. Imaging of intracellular Na⁺ revealed that autophagy is required for Na⁺ sequestration in the central vacuole of root cortex cells following salt treatment. These data suggest that rapid protein turnover through autophagy is a prerequisite for salt stress tolerance in Arabidopsis.

The Physcomitrella patens Chloroplast Proteome Changes in Response to Protoplastation

Plant protoplasts are widely used for genetic manipulation and functional studies in transient expression systems. However, little is known about the molecular pathways involved in a cell response to the combined stress factors resulted from protoplast generation. Plants often face more than one type of stress at a time, and how plants respond to combined stress factors is therefore of great interest. Here, we used protoplasts of the moss Physcomitrella patens as a model to study the effects of short-term stress on the chloroplast proteome. Using label-free comparative quantitative proteomic analysis (SWATH-MS), we quantified 479 chloroplast proteins, 219 of which showed a more than 1.4-fold change in abundance in protoplasts. We additionally quantified 1451 chloroplast proteins using emPAI. We observed degradation of a significant portion of the chloroplast proteome following the first hour of stress imposed by the protoplast isolation process. Electron-transport chain (ETC) components underwent the heaviest degradation, resulting in the decline of photosynthetic activity. We also compared the proteome changes to those in the transcriptional level of nuclear-encoded chloroplast genes. Globally, the levels of the quantified proteins and their corresponding mRNAs showed limited correlation. Genes involved in the biosynthesis of chlorophyll and components of the outer chloroplast membrane showed decreases in both transcript and protein abundance. However, proteins like dehydroascorbate reductase 1 and 2-cys peroxiredoxin B responsible for ROS detoxification increased in abundance. Further, genes such as thylakoid ascorbate peroxidase were induced at the transcriptional level but down-regulated at the proteomic level. Together, our results demonstrate that the initial chloroplast reaction to stress is due changes at the proteomic level.

Comparative analyses of ubiquitin-like ATG8 and cysteine protease ATG4 autophagy genes in the plant lineage and cross-kingdom processing of ATG8 by ATG4

Autophagy is important for degradation and recycling of intracellular components. In a diversity of genera and species, orthologs and paralogs of the yeast Atg4 and Atg8 proteins are crucial in the biogenesis of double-membrane autophagosomes that carry the cellular cargoes to vacuoles and lysosomes. Although many plant genome sequences are available, the ATG4 and ATG8 sequence analysis is limited to some model plants. We identified 28 ATG4 and 116 ATG8 genes from the available 18 different plant genome sequences. Gene structures and protein domain sequences of ATG4 and ATG8 are conserved in plant lineages. Phylogenetic analyses classified ATG8s into 3 subgroups suggesting divergence from the common ancestor. The ATG8 expansion in plants might be attributed to whole genome duplication, segmental and dispersed duplication, and purifying selection. Our results revealed that the yeast Atg4 processes Arabidopsis ATG8 but not human LC3A (HsLC3A). In contrast, HsATG4B can process yeast and plant ATG8s in vitro but yeast and plant ATG4s cannot process HsLC3A. Interestingly, in Nicotiana benthamiana plants the yeast Atg8 is processed compared to HsLC3A. However, HsLC3A is processed when coexpressed with HsATG4B in plants. Molecular modeling indicates that lack of processing of HsLC3A by plant and yeast ATG4 is not due to lack of interaction with HsLC3A. Our in-depth analyses of ATG4 and ATG8 in the plant lineage combined with results of cross-kingdom ATG8 processing by ATG4 further support the evolutionarily conserved maturation of ATG8. Broad ATG8 processing by HsATG4B and lack of processing of HsLC3A by yeast and plant ATG4s suggest that the cross-kingdom ATG8 processing is determined by ATG8 sequence rather than ATG4.

Chloroplast quality control - balancing energy production and stress

Contents 36 I. 36 II. 37 III. 37 IV. 38 V. 39 VI. 40 VII. 40 40 References 40 SUMMARY: All organisms require the ability to sense their surroundings and adapt. Such capabilities allow them to thrive in a wide range of habitats. This is especially true for plants, which are sessile and have to be genetically equipped to withstand every change in their environment. Plants and other eukaryotes use their energy-producing organelles (i.e. mitochondria and chloroplasts) as such sensors. In response to a changing cellular or external environment, these organelles can emit 'retrograde' signals that alter gene expression and/or cell physiology. This signaling is important in plants, fungi, and animals and impacts diverse cellular functions including photosynthesis, energy production/storage, stress responses, growth, cell death, ageing, and tumor progression. Originally, chloroplast retrograde signals in plants were known to lead to the reprogramming of nuclear transcription. New research, however, has pointed to additional posttranslational mechanisms that lead to chloroplast regulation and turnover in response to stress. Such mechanisms involve singlet oxygen, ubiquitination, the 26S proteasome, and cellular degradation machinery.

Mechanistic insights into selective autophagy pathways: lessons from yeast

Autophagy has burgeoned rapidly as a field of study because of its evolutionary conservation, the diversity of intracellular cargoes degraded and recycled by this machinery, the mechanisms involved, as well as its physiological relevance to human health and disease. This self-eating process was initially viewed as a non-selective mechanism used by eukaryotic cells to degrade and recycle macromolecules in response to stress; we now know that various cellular constituents, as well as pathogens, can also undergo selective autophagy. In contrast to non-selective autophagy, selective autophagy pathways rely on a plethora of selective autophagy receptors (SARs) that recognize and direct intracellular protein aggregates, organelles and pathogens for specific degradation. Although SARs themselves are not highly conserved, their modes of action and the signalling cascades that activate and regulate them are. Recent yeast studies have provided novel mechanistic insights into selective autophagy pathways, revealing principles of how various cargoes can be marked and targeted for selective degradation.

hfAIM: A reliable bioinformatics approach for in silico genome-wide identification of autophagy-associated Atg8-interacting motifs in various organisms

Most of the proteins that are specifically turned over by selective autophagy are recognized by the presence of short Atg8 interacting motifs (AIMs) that facilitate their association with the autophagy apparatus. Such AIMs can be identified by bioinformatics methods based on their defined degenerate consensus F/W/Y-X-X-L/I/V sequences in which X represents any amino acid. Achieving reliability and/or fidelity of the prediction of such AIMs on a genome-wide scale represents a major challenge. Here, we present a bioinformatics approach, high fidelity AIM (hfAIM), which uses additional sequence requirements-the presence of acidic amino acids and the absence of positively charged amino acids in certain positions-to reliably identify AIMs in proteins. We demonstrate that the use of the hfAIM method allows for in silico high fidelity prediction of AIMs in AIM-containing proteins (ACPs) on a genome-wide scale in various organisms. Furthermore, by using hfAIM to identify putative AIMs in the Arabidopsis proteome, we illustrate a potential contribution of selective autophagy to various biological processes. More specifically, we identified 9 peroxisomal PEX proteins that contain hfAIM motifs, among which AtPEX1, AtPEX6 and AtPEX10 possess evolutionary-conserved AIMs. Bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC) results verified that AtPEX6 and AtPEX10 indeed interact with Atg8 in planta. In addition, we show that mutations occurring within or nearby hfAIMs in PEX1, PEX6 and PEX10 caused defects in the growth and development of various organisms. Taken together, the above results suggest that the hfAIM tool can be used to effectively perform genome-wide in silico screens of proteins that are potentially regulated by selective autophagy. The hfAIM system is a web tool that can be accessed at link: http://bioinformatics.psb.ugent.be/hfAIM/.

Differential Subplastidial Localization and Turnover of Enzymes Involved in Isoprenoid Biosynthesis in Chloroplasts

Plastidial isoprenoids are a diverse group of metabolites with roles in photosynthesis, growth regulation, and interaction with the environment. The methylerythritol 4-phosphate (MEP) pathway produces the metabolic precursors of all types of plastidial isoprenoids. Proteomics studies in Arabidopsis thaliana have shown that all the enzymes of the MEP pathway are localized in the plastid stroma. However, immunoblot analysis of chloroplast subfractions showed that the first two enzymes of the pathway, deoxyxylulose 5-phosphate synthase (DXS) and reductoisomerase (DXR), can also be found in non-stromal fractions. Both transient and stable expression of GFP-tagged DXS and DXR proteins confirmed the presence of the fusion proteins in distinct subplastidial compartments. In particular, DXR-GFP was found to accumulate in relatively large vesicles that could eventually be released from chloroplasts, presumably to be degraded by an autophagy-independent process. Together, we propose that protein-specific mechanisms control the localization and turnover of the first two enzymes of the MEP pathway in Arabidopsis chloroplasts.

Autophagy in Plants--What's New on the Menu?

Autophagy is a major cellular degradation pathway in eukaryotes. Recent studies have revealed the importance of autophagy in many aspects of plant life, including seedling establishment, plant development, stress resistance, metabolism, and reproduction. This is manifested by the dual ability of autophagy to execute bulk degradation under severe environmental conditions, while simultaneously to be highly selective in targeting specific compartments and protein complexes to regulate key cellular processes, even during favorable growth conditions. Delivery of cellular components to the vacuole enables their recycling, affecting the plant metabolome, especially under stress. Recent research in Arabidopsis has further unveiled fundamental mechanistic aspects in autophagy which may have relevance in non-plant systems. We review the most recent discoveries concerning autophagy in plants, touching upon all these aspects.

Origin of the Autophagosomal Membrane in Plants

During autophagy, cargo molecules destined for degradation are sequestrated into a double-membrane structure called autophagosome, which subsequently fuses with the vacuole. An isolation membrane structure (also called the phagophore) initiates from the platform termed PAS (phagophore assembly site or preautophagosomal structure), which then elongates and expands to become the completed autophagosome. The origin of the membrane for autophagosome formation has been extensively investigated but remains an enigma in the field of autophagy. In yeast and mammalian cells multiple membrane sources have been suggested to contribute to autophagosome formation at different steps, from initiation through expansion and maturation. Recent studies in plants have provided a significant advance in our understanding of the conserved role of autophagy and the underlying mechanism for autophagosome formation. Here, we will discuss and evaluate these new findings on autophagosome formation in plants, with a particular focus on the origin of plant autophagosomal membranes.