Heat Shock Transcription Factors as Integrative Hubs for Plant Stress Adaptation: Decoding Regulatory Networks Toward Climate-Resilient Crop Design.

Abstract

As sessile organisms, plants deploy heat shock transcription factors (HSFs) as key coordinators within a broader transcriptional network that includes bZIPs, MYBs, NACs, and DREBs to combat abiotic/biotic stresses under climate change. Beyond activating heat shock proteins and antioxidant systems, HSFs maintain redox homoeostasis by orchestrating hormone pathways and ROS-hormone signalling crosstalk, and enhance cross-kingdom defence through secondary metabolite synthesis, thus extending their function from thermotolerance to drought, salinity, and pathogen defence. However, current research is limited by overreliance on model plants, unclear HSF dynamics under coupled stresses, and unresolved epigenetic regulation of stress memory. Furthermore, CRISPR editing faces challenges with multigene coordination and field validation. This review integrates HSF structural evolution and network mechanisms, proposing innovative strategies: cross-species genomics, computational modelling of HSF networks, CRISPR-based synthetic stress circuits, and targeted epigenetic modifications for transgenerational resilience. These approaches aim to elucidate HSF-mediated epigenetic stress memory, bridging molecular research with stress-resilient crop breeding to provide a blueprint for next-generation climate-smart crops and sustainable solutions for global food security.