Forward genetics and biochemical approaches to studying plant responses to salt, water and cold stresses began to bear fruit recently. Analysis of salt overly sensitive (sos) Arabidopsis mutants revealed a novel calcium-regulated protein kinase pathway for response to the ionic aspect of salt stress. In-gel kinase assays identified several SOS-independent protein kinases that are either activat...

All plants studied in natural ecosystems are symbiotic with fungi that either reside entirely (endophytes) or partially (mycorrhizae) within plants. These symbioses appear to adapt to biotic and abiotic stresses and may be responsible for the survival of both plant hosts and fungal symbionts in high stress habitats. Here we describe the role of symbiotic fungi in plant stress tolerance and pres...

Abiotic stress causes major crop losses and is considered a greater challenge than biotic stress. Comparisons of the number of published articles and patents regarding these different types of stresses, and the number of commercially released crops designed to tolerate different types of stresses, revealed a huge gap in the bench-to-field transfer rate of abiotic stress-tolerant crops, as compa...

The response of plants to biotic and abiotic stress factors involves biochemical, physiological, morphological, and developmental changes. Salt stress has been the subject of extensive studies due to the low salt tolerance of many crop plants. Germin and germin-like gene products are known to be involved in various aspects of plant development, such as defense, embryonic development and respons...