Plant Abiotic Stress Tolerance on the Transcriptomics Atlas

Climate change-associated environmental stresses significantly affect crop production by altering plant physiology, reducing yield and product quality. Drought, salinity, extreme temperatures and heavy metals impose stress conditions, which have become the major limiting factors for plant productivity. Thus, there is a greater need to develop genetic, agronomic and biotechnological strategies to invigorate plants with a defense arsenal against stress factors, singly and in combination. Advances in molecular biology techniques and genomics have led to the generation of extensive knowledge about plants’ molecular responses. The plant transcriptome under stress presents the gene expression atlas of all the genes in an organ, cell or tissue at a stage of growth or development. Transcriptomics studies have contributed significantly to the understanding of complex metabolic pathways, regulatory and signaling networks associated with the plant defense and tolerance responses to stresses. In some crop plants, differentially expressed stress-related candidate genes have been identified and functionally characterized. Furthermore, studies in halophytes have characterized diverse salt-responsive genes, which have been useful in improving stress tolerance of other crops. Herein, we present an overview of the transcriptomics applications in understanding plant responses to the abiotic stresses drought, salt, and heat, which are significant for developing tolerance mechanisms and designing climate-smart crops.