Nitrogen signaling and use efficiency in plants: what's new?

Qian Liu; Xiangbin Chen; Kun Wu; Xiangdong Fu

doi:10.1016/j.pbi.2015.08.002

Nitrogen signaling and use efficiency in plants: what's new?

Curr Opin Plant Biol. 2015 Oct:27:192-8. doi: 10.1016/j.pbi.2015.08.002. Epub 2015 Sep 2.

Authors

Qian Liu¹, Xiangbin Chen¹, Kun Wu¹, Xiangdong Fu²

Affiliations

¹ The State Key Laboratory of Plant Cell and Chromosome Engineering, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, PR China.
² The State Key Laboratory of Plant Cell and Chromosome Engineering, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, PR China. Electronic address: xdfu@genetics.ac.cn.

PMID: 26340108
DOI: 10.1016/j.pbi.2015.08.002

Abstract

Crop productivity is heavily dependent on the application of nitrogen (N) fertilizers. Increasing N fertilization levels, however, are subject to diminishing returns, quite apart from their deleterious impact on the environment. Improving N use efficiency (NUE) is therefore crucial for development of sustainable agriculture. Plant NUE is a complex trait determined by quantitative trait loci and influenced by environmental changes. The natural supply of soil N varies and is frequently limiting for plant growth and crop yield: unraveling the molecular basis of how plants sense and respond to changes in N availability should enable the development of new strategies to increase NUE. This review discusses the latest advances in our understanding of N signaling and crosstalk with other signaling pathways.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Review

MeSH terms

Nitrogen / metabolism*
Plant Physiological Phenomena*
Signal Transduction*

Substances

Nitrogen