Uncovering the genetic basis for variation in adaptive responses to water deficit in Arabidopsis thaliana roots

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Water deficit is a major stress for plants in nature, but relatively little is known about the molecular mechanisms roots use to adapt to this environmental condition, mainly due to the difficulty of simulating such conditions in the laboratory. GLO-Roots (Growth and Luminescence Observatory of Roots) offers the unique opportunity to visualize changes in root system architecture in soil-grown Arabidopsis thaliana plants under water deficit treatment. Preliminary data show that roots avoid drying soil by increasing gravity response and we hypothesize that this avoidance mechanism is diverse among a population of Arabidopsis thaliana accessions from different climatic areas. A genome wide association study will be performed to find the genetic basis of potential changes in root system architecture under water deficit. In addition, accessions with extreme phenotypes will be crossed and causative loci identified by bulk-segregant analysis and/or Quantitative Trait Loci-mapping. Lastly, to investigate if deeper root growth is mediated by stress-induced hormone signaling, characterization of the spatiotemporal dynamics of hormone-responive reporters and reverse genetic approaches will be conducted. In conclusion, we aim at revealing molecular mechanisms regulating changes in root system architecture in response to water deficit in Arabidopsis thaliana using the GLO-Roots system.