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Molecular Crosstalk Between Flowering Time and Drought Adaptation in Cereal Crops
Song Song1, Xiaowei Fan1, Nannan Zhang1
1College of Life Sciences, Henan Agricultural University, Zhengzhou 450002, China.
Plants (Basel, Switzerland)
|July 15, 2026
Summary
Crops use drought escape and avoidance strategies to survive. This review explores how flowering time and drought response pathways interact, offering insights for breeding climate-resilient cereal crops.
Area of Science:
- Plant Biology
- Agronomy
- Genetics
Background:
- Drought events increasingly threaten global agriculture.
- Cereal crops employ drought escape (DE) and drought avoidance (DA) for survival and reproduction.
- Molecular links between photoperiodic flowering and drought response pathways are not well understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To review recent advances in the crosstalk between flowering time and drought response pathways in cereals.
- To highlight key genetic hubs and molecular networks involved in this interaction.
- To propose a framework for breeding climate-resilient crops.
Main Methods:
- Literature review of recent research on plant responses to drought and flowering time.
- Analysis of molecular mechanisms and genetic factors governing the intersection of these pathways.
- Examination of signaling networks including circadian clock, sugar signaling, and phytohormones.
Main Results:
- Identified core genetic hubs (florigen, GIGANTEA, DELLA proteins, dual-function transcription factors) and their divergent roles.
- Highlighted breeding-selected alleles (e.g., Green Revolution variants) that impact stress tolerance-development trade-offs.
- Detailed internal networks: circadian clock phase shifts, trehalose-6-phosphate (T6P)-SNF1-related protein kinase 1 (SnRK1) signaling, and abscisic acid (ABA) networks.
Conclusions:
- Integrating epigenetic stress memory, root-to-shoot signaling, and CRISPR/Cas promoter engineering can enhance crop resilience.
- Understanding the crosstalk is crucial for developing climate-resilient, yield-stable cereal crops.
- Targeted genetic strategies can potentially uncouple stress tolerance from yield penalties.
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