Doil Choi and colleagues report the genome sequence of the hot pepper, Capsicum annuum, as well as the resequencing of two cultivated peppers and a wild species, Capsicum chinense. Comparative genomic analysis across Solanaceae provides insights into genome expansion, pungency, ripening and disease resistance in hot peppers.

Drought and cold represent distinct types of abiotic stress, each initiating unique primary signaling pathways in response to dehydration and temperature changes, respectively. However, a convergence at the gene regulatory level is observed where a common set of stress-responsive genes is activated to mitigate the impacts of both stresses. In this review, we explore these intricate regulatory networks, illustrating how plants coordinate distinct stress signals into a collective transcriptional strategy. We delve into the molecular mechanisms of stress perception, stress signaling, and the activation of gene regulatory pathways, with a focus on insights gained from model species. By elucidating both the shared and distinct aspects of plant responses to drought and cold, we provide insight into the adaptive strategies of plants, paving the way for the engineering of stress-resilient crop varieties that can withstand a changing climate.

In plants, osmotic stress-responsive transcriptional regulation depends mainly on two major classes of cis-acting elements found in the promoter regions of stress-inducible genes: ABA-responsive elements (ABREs) and dehydration-responsive elements (DREs). ABRE has been shown to perceive ABA-mediated osmotic stress signals, whereas DRE is known to be involved in an ABA-independent pathway. Previously, we reported that the transcription factor DRE-BINDING PROTEIN 2A (DREB2A) regulates DRE-mediated transcription of target genes under osmotic stress conditions in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). However, the transcriptional regulation of DREB2A itself remains largely uncharacterized. To elucidate the transcriptional mechanism associated with the DREB2A gene under osmotic stress conditions, we generated a series of truncated and base-substituted variants of the DREB2A promoter and evaluated their transcriptional activities individually. We found that both ABRE and coupling element 3 (CE3)-like sequences located approximately −100 bp from the transcriptional initiation site are necessary for the dehydration-responsive expression of DREB2A. Coupling our transient expression analyses with yeast one-hybrid and chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) assays indicated that the ABRE-BINDING PROTEIN 1 (AREB1), AREB2 and ABRE-BINDING FACTOR 3 (ABF3) bZIP transcription factors can bind to and activate the DREB2A promoter in an ABRE-dependent manner. Exogenous ABA application induced only a modest accumulation of the DREB2A transcript when compared with the osmotic stress treatment. However, the osmotic stress-induced DREB2A expression was found to be markedly impaired in several ABA-deficient and ABA-insensitive mutants. These results suggest that in addition to an ABA-independent pathway, the ABA-dependent pathway plays a positive role in the osmotic stress-responsive expression of DREB2A.

Arabidopsis thaliana DEHYDRATION-RESPONSIVE ELEMENT BINDING PROTEIN2A (DREB2A) functions as a transcriptional activator that increases tolerance to osmotic and heat stresses; however, its expression also leads to growth retardation and reduced reproduction. To avoid these adverse effects, the expression of DREB2A is predicted to be tightly regulated. We identified a short promoter region of DREB2A that represses its expression under nonstress conditions. Yeast one-hybrid screening for interacting factors identified GROWTH-REGULATING FACTOR7 (GRF7). GRF7 bound to the DREB2A promoter and repressed its expression. In both artificial miRNA-silenced lines and a T-DNA insertion line of GRF7, DREB2A transcription was increased compared with the wild type under nonstress conditions. A previously undiscovered cis-element, GRF7-targeting cis-element (TGTCAGG), was identified as a target sequence of GRF7 in the short promoter region of DREB2A via electrophoretic mobility shift assays. Microarray analysis of GRF7 knockout plants showed that a large number of the upregulated genes in the mutant plants were also responsive to osmotic stress and/or abscisic acid. These results suggest that GRF7 functions as a repressor of a broad range of osmotic stress–responsive genes to prevent growth inhibition under normal conditions.

The unfolded protein response (UPR) is a eukaryotic transcriptional regulatory network that is activated upon the accumulation of malformed proteins in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). In Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana), three bZIP transcription factors modulate the UPR: bZIP17, bZIP28, and bZIP60. Although bZIP28 and bZIP60 have been relatively well studied, the physiological and transcriptional roles of bZIP17 remain largely unknown. Here, we generated a double knockout mutant of bZIP17 and bZIP28 to elucidate the function of bZIP17. The mutant plant exhibited multiple developmental defects, including markedly reduced root elongation and constantly overinduced bZIP60 activity, indicating the essential roles of bZIP17 and bZIP28 in plant development and UPR modulation. Extended analysis of the transcriptomes of three double knockout mutants of bZIP17, bZIP28, and bZIP60 revealed that bZIP28 and bZIP60 are the major activators of the canonical induced UPR. By contrast, bZIP17 functions with bZIP28 to mediate the noninducible expression of multiple genes involved in cell growth, particularly to sustain their expression under stress conditions. Our study reveals pivotal roles of bZIP17 in the plant UPR and vegetative development, with functional redundancy to bZIP28.