Molecular mechanisms underlying plant cell death in response to cell wall stress

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Recently, a lot of interest has focused on the production of plants with high cellulose content that could be used as renewable source of biofuel feed stock. Cellulose is a complex sugar found in plant cell walls, where it is associated with hemicellulose, pectins and structural or regulatory proteins. Plant cell walls form an extracellular matrix essential to protect plant cells from environmental factors and invading pathogens. The exact composition and structure of plant cell walls change during plant growth and development and can also be modified in response to various adverse conditions to ensure plant growth and survival. Interestingly, plant cells can progressively be adapted to cell wall stress caused by inhibitors of cellulose synthesis. Nonetheless, important perturbations in the synthesis and organisation of the cell wall may lead to cell death. This research will study how cell wall modifications such as those caused by reduced cellulose synthesis are perceived by plant cells. Cell wall modifications will be induced in the plant model Arabidopsis thaliana using inhibitors of cellulose synthesis. We will also determine how these perturbations can activate cell repair and compensatory mechanisms or may lead to cell death. This study will bring important information on the mechanisms used by plant cells to respond to cell wall damage as induced by wounding or pathogens. This information may also be useful for the optimization of bioenergy crops and their cell walls for industrial processing.