Spermine: Its Emerging Role in Regulating Drought Stress Responses in Plants
Md. Mahadi Hasan,
Milan Skalicky,
Mohammad Shah Jahan,
Md. Nazmul Hossain,
Zunaira Anwar,
Zheng-Fei Nie,
Nadiyah M. Alabdallah,
Marian Brestic,
Vaclav Hejnak,
Xiang-Wen Fang
Affiliations
Md. Mahadi Hasan
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
Milan Skalicky
Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, 16500 Prague, Czech Republic
Mohammad Shah Jahan
Key Laboratory of Southern Vegetable Crop Genetic Improvement in Ministry of Agriculture, College of Horticulture, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 210095, China
Md. Nazmul Hossain
Key Laboratory of Crop Physiology and Ecology in Southern China, Ministry of Agriculture, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 210095, China
Zunaira Anwar
Department of Botany, Faculty of Sciences, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Faisalabad 38000, Pakistan
Zheng-Fei Nie
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
Nadiyah M. Alabdallah
Department of Biology, College of Science, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, 383, Dammam 34212, Saudi Arabia
Marian Brestic
Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, 16500 Prague, Czech Republic
Vaclav Hejnak
Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, 16500 Prague, Czech Republic
Xiang-Wen Fang
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
In recent years, research on spermine (Spm) has turned up a lot of new information about this essential polyamine, especially as it is able to counteract damage from abiotic stresses. Spm has been shown to protect plants from a variety of environmental insults, but whether it can prevent the adverse effects of drought has not yet been reported. Drought stress increases endogenous Spm in plants and exogenous application of Spm improves the plants’ ability to tolerate drought stress. Spm’s role in enhancing antioxidant defense mechanisms, glyoxalase systems, methylglyoxal (MG) detoxification, and creating tolerance for drought-induced oxidative stress is well documented in plants. However, the influences of enzyme activity and osmoregulation on Spm biosynthesis and metabolism are variable. Spm interacts with other molecules like nitric oxide (NO) and phytohormones such as abscisic acid, salicylic acid, brassinosteroids, and ethylene, to coordinate the reactions necessary for developing drought tolerance. This review focuses on the role of Spm in plants under severe drought stress. We have proposed models to explain how Spm interacts with existing defense mechanisms in plants to improve drought tolerance.
