The plant epigenome governed by nutrients and metabolism

Abstract

Nutrients are essential regulators of growth and development across all life forms, serving not only as energetic resources and structural building blocks but also as dynamic signals that govern cell proliferation, metabolism, growth and development. Nutrients and metabolic processes orchestrate plant developmental programs and plasticity via the coordination with dynamic changes in the epigenomic landscape, which is fundamental for governing gene expression programs and developmental transitions in multicellular organisms. In this review, we explore the interplay between nutrition, metabolism, and epigenetic reprogramming in plants, with a particular focus on the novel mechanisms, including nuclear localized metabolic enzymes, moonlighting functions of metabolic enzymes, epigenetic regulators as metabolic sensors, and nutrient sensing and signaling pathways. Elucidating these mechanisms holds significant implications for understanding plant growth and development and improving crop yield and quality.