Cross species multi‐omics reveals cell wall sequestration and elevated global transcript abundance as mechanisms of boron tolerance in plants

Boron toxicity is a world-wide problem for crops, yet we have limited understanding of the genetic responses and adaptive mechanisms to this stress in plants. We employed cross-species comparison between boron stress-sensitive Arabidopsis thaliana its stress-tolerant extremophyte relative Schrenkiella parvula, multi-omics approach integrating genomics, transcriptomics, metabolomics ionomics assess plant adaptations stress. parvula maintains lower concentrations total free boric acid than when grown with excess boron. excludes more efficiently Arabidopsis, which propose partly driven by SpBOR5, transporter that functionally characterize study. Both species use cell walls as partial sink When accumulated cytoplasm, appears interrupt RNA metabolism. The S. facilitates critical cellular processes while maintaining pool ribose-containing compounds can bind acid. transcriptome pre-adapted toxicity. It exhibits substantial overlaps boron-stress responsive transcriptome. Cell wall sequestration increases global transcript levels under conditions emerge key sustaining growth