Melatonin's Role in Enhancing Waterlogging Tolerance in Plants: Current Understanding and Future Directions.

Area of Science:

• Plant Physiology
• Molecular Biology
• Environmental Science

Background:

• Waterlogging, exacerbated by climate change, severely impacts plant growth by limiting root oxygen, disrupting metabolism, and causing oxidative stress.
• Melatonin is a signaling molecule known to mitigate various abiotic stresses in plants.

Purpose of the Study:

• To review and synthesize current knowledge on melatonin's protective mechanisms against waterlogging stress.
• To highlight underexplored areas, including transcriptional regulation, epigenetic processes, and plant-microbe interactions.

Main Methods:

• Literature review and synthesis of existing research on melatonin and waterlogging.
• Integration of physiological, molecular, and ecological perspectives.

Main Results:

• Melatonin enhances anaerobic respiration, upregulates stress genes, optimizes sugar metabolism, and strengthens antioxidant defenses.
• It also modulates phytohormone signaling and influences the rhizosphere microbiome.

Conclusions:

• Melatonin offers multifaceted protection against waterlogging stress through various physiological and molecular pathways.
• Further research on melatonin's role in gene regulation and plant-microbe interactions is crucial for developing waterlogging-resilient crops.