Light signals regulating alternative splicing in Arabidopsis

EZEQUIEL PETRILLO; MARIA KALYNA; ANDREA BARTA

París

Congreso; Post-transcriptional Gene Regulation in Plants; 2015

Light is a source of energy and also a regulator of plant physiological adaptations. We recently showed that light/dark conditions affect alternative splicing of a subset of Arabidopsis genes preferentially encoding proteins involved in RNA processing. The effect requires functional chloroplasts and is also observed in roots when the communication with the photosynthetic tissues is not interrupted, suggesting that a signaling molecule travels through the plant. We are now trying to identify the nature of the light signals that communicate the chloroplast status to the nuclei of leaf and root cells. By using different approaches we want to elucidate the roles of sugars as possible mobile signals and also the involvement of the spliceosome and the RNA polymerase II as possible targets and/or effectors of these light signaling pathways.