The Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) Early Light-Induced Protein (ELIP) is thought to act as a photoprotectant, reducing the damaging effects of high light (HL). Expression of ELIP2 is activated by multiple environmental stresses related to photoinhibition. We have identified putative regulatory elements in an ELIP2 promoter using an octamer-based frequency comparison method, analyzed the rol...

UV-B radiation in sunlight has diverse effects on humans, animals, plants, and microorganisms. UV-B can cause damage to molecules and cells, and consequently organisms need to protect against and repair UV damage to survive in sunlight. In plants, low nondamaging levels of UV-B stimulate transcription of genes involved in UV-protective responses. However, remarkably little is known about the un...

CONSTITUTIVE PHOTOMORPHOGENIC1 (COP1) is a RING/WD40 repeat-containing ubiquitin E3 ligase that is conserved from plants to humans. COP1 forms complexes with SUPPRESSOR OF PHYTOCHROME A (SPA) proteins, and these complexes degrade positively acting transcription factors in the dark to repress photomorphogenesis. Phytochrome-interacting basic helix-loop-helix transcription factors (PIFs) also rep...

CONSTITUTIVE PHOTOMORPHOGENIC 1 (COP1) functions as an E3 ubiquitin ligase and mediates a variety of developmental processes in Arabidopsis by targeting a number of key regulators for ubiquitination and degradation. Here, we identify a novel COP1 interacting protein, COP1 SUPPRESSOR 2 (CSU2). Loss of function mutations in CSU2 suppress the constitutive photomorphogenic phenotype of cop1-6 in da...

ARI12 belongs to a family of 16 potential E3 ligases in Arabidopsis and is strongly induced in leaves upon low and high fluence rates (HFR) of UV-B. We have shown that ARI12 is a downstream target of the UV-B receptor, UVR8, and the transcription factors HY5 and HYH under low fluence rates. However under HFR of broad band UV-B ARI12 expression was still downstream of HY5 and HYH but increased i...

A B-box zinc finger protein, B-BOX32 (BBX32), was identified as playing a role in determining hypocotyl length during a large-scale functional genomics study in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). Further analysis revealed that seedlings overexpressing BBX32 display elongated hypocotyls in red, far-red, and blue light, along with reduced cotyledon expansion in red light. Through comparative ana...

A new report shows that the HY5 transcription factor moves from shoots to roots in plants, mediating light regulation of root growth and nitrate uptake. This finding offers not only a mechanistic insight into shoot-root communication, but also scope for increasing crop yields.