Developing temperature-resilient salicylic acid-mediated immunity in a warming climate

Abstract

Salicylic acid (SA) is known to be one of the central phytohormones for defense against pathogens and pests and tolerance to various abiotic stresses. Recent research clearly shows that heatwaves under climate change exacerbate plant disease across the world. SA production and signaling are particularly vulnerable to elevated temperatures, suggesting that warming temperatures could be one of the rate-limiting factors for impaired plant immunity in future climate conditions. In this study, we show that suppression of SA production and signaling under suboptimal temperatures are conserved phenomena across plant taxa, causing exacerbated immunity at warming temperatures. We identified the transcription of CBP60g/SARD1 as unique rate-limiting steps to recover SA-mediated immunity under elevated temperatures. Elevated temperatures negatively reprogram transcriptional machinery including the recruitment of GUANYLATE BINDING PROTEIN-LIKE 3 (GBPL3) defense-associated biomolecular condensates (GDAC) along with general transcription machinery at CBP60g locus. Thus, our results indicate how elevated temperature affects the plant immune system and how we might build temperature-resilient plant immunity for warming climates.