UC Davis

Considering their sessile life, plants must efficiently coordinate their resources and energy for maintaining their presence in normal living conditions and for defending themselves against environmental threats. Collaboration between multiple subcellular compartments is a common strategy in several biological processes to modify cells' architecture for their growth and development and to respond to acute changes in the environment. When plants defend themselves against microbial pathogens, chloroplasts generate tubular structures - so-called stromules- to facilitate chloroplast movement towards nuclei during innate immunity. Morphological changes and movements of stromules are directed by interactions with microtubule and actin cytoskeleton. Microtubules provide a direction for the stromule extension, while actin filaments restrict stromule retraction which provides a driving force for repositioning of chloroplast near nucleus during plant immune responses. These findings implicated a critical role for stromules in signal transduction from chloroplast to the nucleus in plant defense.