Understanding a Mutant that Disregulates Trehalose 6-Phosphate Action in Plants

在光合作用中形成的蔗糖是合成所有植物产品的起点，包括那些与生长发育有关的产品，收获的作物器官，淀粉、细胞壁、蛋白质和脂类的合成，这些都是食物、纤维、饲料和燃料的成分。海藻糖6-磷酸（Trehalose 6-phosphate, T6P）是一种与蔗糖生物学密切相关的糖信号或糖燃料计，将有关蔗糖可用性的信息传递给细胞。尽管T6P信号系统在植物和作物中具有不可缺少的重要性，但关于调节T6P积累的机制仍有许多未解之谜。这是一项重大的科学挑战，即植物“血糖”的调节和T6P决定整体生长、产量和对非生物和生物胁迫的抗性的基础，并以提高作物产量和作物抗逆性的形式转化。为了解决植物如何调节T6P积累及其所依赖的所有这些过程的基本问题，我们汇集了化学生物学和分子植物科学研究人员的独特合作，应用分子遗传学，生化，化学和多组学联盟中无与伦比的工具来了解特定海藻糖磷酸合成酶和蛋白激酶的作用及其相互作用，以及与其他蛋白质和配体的相互作用。

Sucrose formed in photosynthesis is the starting point for the synthesis of all plant products including those involved in growth and development, the harvested organs of crops, and the synthesis of starch, cell walls, proteins and lipids, which are the constituents of food, fibre, feed and fuel. Trehalose 6-phosphate (T6P) is a sugar signal, or sugar fuel gauge intimately involved with sucrose biology relaying information to cells about the availably of sucrose. Despite the indispensable importance of the T6P signalling system in plants and crops there are many unanswered questions about the mechanisms involved in regulating the accumulation of T6P. This has important implications as a science grand challenge i.e. the regulation of plant "blood sugar" and the basis of T6P's determination of overall growth, yield and resistance to abiotic and biotic stresses, and translation in the form of increased crop yields and crop resilience. To address the fundamental question of how plants regulate T6P accumulation and hence all these processes on which this depends, we bring together a unique collaboration of researchers in chemical biology and molecular plant science applying tools unrivalled in one consortium of molecular genetic, biochemical, chemical and multi omics to understand the role of specific trehalose phosphate synthases and a protein kinase and their interaction with each other, and with other proteins and ligands.