The plasma membrane as a mechanotransducer in plants

Abstract

The plasma membrane is a physical boundary made of amphiphilic lipid molecules, proteins and carbohydrates extensions. Its role in mechanotransduction generates increasing attention in animal systems, where membrane tension is mainly induced by cortical actomyosin. In plant cells, cortical tension is of osmotic origin. Yet, because the plasma membrane in plant cells has comparable physical properties, findings from animal systems likely apply to plant cells too. Recent results suggest that this is indeed the case, with a role of membrane tension in vesicle trafficking, mechanosensitive channel opening or cytoskeleton organization in plant cells. Prospects for the plant science community are at least three fold: (i) to develop and use probes to monitor membrane tension in tissues, in parallel with other biochemical probes, with implications for protein activity and nanodomain clustering, (ii) to develop single cell approaches to decipher the mechanisms operating at the plant cell cortex at high spatio-temporal resolution, and (iii) to revisit the role of membrane composition at cell and tissue scale, by considering the physical implications of phospholipid properties and interactions in mechanotransduction.

Nuclear envelope dynamics in connection to chromatin remodeling

“…As plants are sessile organisms, they are constantly subjected to external mechanical stresses such as wind, rain or wounding for aerial parts and osmotic pressure and soil rigidity for roots. While relevant cortical mechanosensing pathways start to be deciphered in plants (Colin & Hamant, 2021), the nuclear mechano‐transduction linking nuclear mechanics to specific gene expression patterns and cell fate decisions remains elusive (Fal et al., 2017).…”

Mechanotransduction in the spotlight of mechano-sensitive channels

“…Even in absence of environmental mechanical solicitation, plants are constantly exposed to mechanical forces due to their high internal cell turgor pressure. At the cellular scale, hydrostatic pressure generated by the vacuole "pushes" the cytosol against the cell wall, this situation is thought to put the plasma membrane or some of its domains under tension [1]. At the tissue scale, it was shown in the shoot apical meristem and in the hypocotyl that the epidermis is under tension whilst inner tissues are under compression [2]- [5].…”