Guanylyl Cyclases and cGMP in Higher PlantsIt is emerging that cyclic nucleotides and hence the cyclic nucleotide generating enzymes such as adenylyl and guanylyl cyclases (GCs) 1 have key roles in many and diverse biological processes. 2-5 Here we shall mainly focus on GCs and cGMP. The latter is critically implicated in responses to both abiotic and biotic stress responses, 6-8 the gating of channels, 9,10 plant hormone signal transduction, 11,12 nitric oxide (NO)-dependent signaling 13-16 as well as the regulation of transcription. 17 While there are currently only two experimentally confirmed GCs in higher plants, 18,19 this number has been predicted to significantly increase based on the presence of putative GC catalytic centers in many Arabidopsis thaliana proteins 20 and the number (>100) of annotated nucleotide cyclases in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. 4,20 We hypothesize that many more processes that are also critically dependent on the second messenger cGMP remain to be discovered and that catalytic domains capable of generating cGMP from GTP are part of a growing family of highly diverse multi-domain enzymes.
Cyclic GMP in Plant Stress ResponsesIt has been previously been demonstrated that cGMP levels in Arabidopsis thaliana seedlings increase very rapidly (onset: ≤5 seconds), time dependently and, importantly, to different degrees in response to salt and osmotic stress, and that salt stress activates two distinct cGMP signalling pathways. 7 The osmotic pathway is independent of the second messenger [Ca 2+ ] c while the ionic response pathway, triggered by high NaCl, is [Ca 2+ ] c -dependent. These findings are an indication that cGMP plays a complex role in stress responses that cannot be accounted for by simple "on/ off " mechanisms. Contrary to the rapid changes in response to osmoticum dependent and ionic stress, responses to NO 6 and gravitropic stimulus appear to be much slower 21 and to the best of our knowledge, to-date there is no indication to suggest a link between the causing stimulus and the amplitude of resulting cGMP increases in biotic interactions between pathogens and their plant hosts.We have measured cGMP accumulation in Arabidopsis thaliana leaves following inoculation with virulent (DC3000) and avirulent