Editorial: Essence of Survival: Impact of Primary and Secondary Metabolism on Plant Acclimatization to Abiotic Stresses

Saad Sulieman^1*Weiqiang Li²Lam-Son Phan Tran^3*

• ¹Faculty of Agriculture, University of Khartoum, Karthoum North, Sudan
• ²State Key Laboratory of CAD and CG, Hangzhou, China
• ³Texas Tech University, Lubbock, United States

The most sustainable strategy to feed the growing population is intensifying research efforts to design new elite genotypes to achieve global food security. Understanding the mechanisms and strategies of plant acclimatization to a dynamic and often hostile environment remains a pressing issue. These priorities are essential given the sessile nature of crop plants and the significant threats relating to global climatic conditions. With this perspective, this Research Topic was established to bring cutting-edge research to unlock plant resilience to abiotic stresses. The central theme was to compile the recent studies deciphering the interplay of primary and secondary metabolism on plant acclimatization to sub-optimal or adverse environmental conditions. Mechanisms and strategies of plant acclimatization to abiotic stresses By constructing a high-quality transcript isoform library and performing comparative genomic 79 analysis for leaf samples, the authors tried to set the foundation for functional genomics studies 80 provide advanced knowledge of this plant species, which has reference genome yet. Following the 81 identification of differentially expressed genes and accumulated metabolites, the 82 advanced multi-omic analysis revealed that flavonoid biosynthesis in that plant species is associated 83 with their cold tolerance. The correlation analyses also showed a close relationship between 84 transcription factors and some genes that code for proteins, particularly within the flavonoid 85 biosynthetic route. 86 Following their previous attempts to promote crop tolerance to adverse stressful events using low-88 cost, practical approaches, Hassan et al. (Click Here) have conducted a further study using 89 metabolome assays to characterize the contribution of diethyl aminoethyl hexanoate (DA-6), a plant 90 growth regulator, to improving the tolerance of water-stressed white clover (Trifolium repens) leaves. 91The DA-6-exogenous application resulted in a profound reprogramming of numerous leaf metabolic 92 pathways (e.g., those related to photosynthesis, oxidative stress responses, and cell membrane 93 stability), resulting in a higher drought tolerance under water-limited conditions. By unlocking the 94 metabolite profile, it was evident that the foliar spray of DA-6 promoted the pool size of key 95 metabolites (e.g., organic acids, amino acids, and sugar alcohols) that could help sustain the white 96 clover acclimatization to water deficit by boosting the cell membrane stability, photosynthetic 97 efficiency, water balance and oxidative damage. 98 We believe that this Research Topic is timely and provides significant advances that could contribute 100 to the ongoing efforts to promote our mechanistic and conceptual understanding of plants' abiotic 101 stress acclimatization in the challenging decades ahead. Future studies should focus on unraveling the 102 complex intrinsic regulatory mechanisms that coordinate and fine-tune homeostasis between primary 103 and secondary metabolism during stressful events, especially under field conditions where multiple 104 stress events concurrently occur. Furthermore, deciphering the molecular codes that control 105 metabolic flexibility in a broad range of plant genotypes that endure abiotic stress resilience remains 106 of great potential value. Further promising research avenues encompass how plant-specific 107 metabolites interact synergistically in responses to external cues and how such metabolic cross-talk 108 can be efficiently employed to design stress-tolerant crops with higher productivity. 109 The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial 111 relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. 112 All authors have contributed to the work and approved it for publication. 114 Funding 115 As topic editors, we thank the authors for their valuable contributions to this Research Topic. We 118 also extend our thanks the editorial staff of Frontiers in Plant Science for their unlimited 119 support and assistance. 120