Auxentric - a hormone-based mechanism to control chromatin state

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The fate of all cells, whether unicellular or part of a multicellular organism, is a function of the genes they express. During the development of multicellular organisms, mobile molecules such as hormones regulate cell fate by controlling gene expression. The plant hormone auxin was one of the first hormones to be studied and the effect of auxin on light-regulated plant growth (phototropism) was investigated by Charles Darwin and his son Francis in the 1880s. It was, however, not until the 1930s that the auxin molecule was isolated and its molecular structure determined as indole 3-acetic acid (IAA). In plants, auxin plays an essential role in initiating organ formation and in patterning the organs in specific tissue types, for example, lateral roots, young leaves and the gynoecium (the female reproductive organ). In the classical auxin-signalling mechanism, the auxin molecule promotes the interaction between specific proteins thereby causing the breakdown of repressors of gene expression. It has also been established that auxin can influence its own transport by controlling the localisation of auxin transporters. Although these mechanisms of auxin signalling can explain many processes of auxin action, other transcriptional signalling pathways are likely to exist to account for the multitude of processes in which auxin plays a role. We have recently described an alternative auxin-signalling pathway mediated by the auxin response factor, ETTIN, which plays a particularly important role during the establishment of polarity in organ development. This novel auxin-signalling mechanism (referred to here as the 'Auxentric' mechanism) is fundamentally different from established processes of auxin signalling as it involves a direct effect of the hormone molecule on ETTIN-transcription factor (TF) complexes without the involvement of protein degradation. Interestingly, our preliminary data suggest that this effect leads to changes in chromatin states in a mechanism similar to thyroid hormone signalling in animals. In this proposal, we will reveal the mechanism by which auxin mediates its effect on ETTIN-containing complexes to control gene expression. We will, moreover, unravel the biophysical and structural characteristics of the protein and hormonal components involved. Above and beyond this specific mechanism, Auxentric may have far-reaching implications for the existence of alternative mechanisms by which hormones regulate plant growth and development. The work proposed here will thus introduce a novel gene expression-based mechanism of hormone perception in plants and draw unprecedented links between auxin dynamics and gene regulation at the chromatin level.