Sound-elicited epigenetic modulation orchestrates plant root immunity

Abstract

Although previous approaches for plant immune enhancement focused on using chemical or biological agents, recent studies surely suggested that sound vibration (SV) as a physical trigger also could induce plant resistance. Induced resistance is a complicated process containing epigenetic regulation while SV-mediated induced resistance has only been reported based on phenomenological changes, research on epigenetic aspects has been unexplored. Here, we perform integrative analyses of chromatin-immunoprecipitation (ChIP)-seq, microRNA (miRNA)-seq, and RNA-seq regarding the SV-mediated epigenetic changes in Arabidopsis against a root bacterial pathogen, Ralstonia solanacearum. My results revealed that the modification of H3K27me3 largely overlaps with binding sites of upstream of glucosinolate and cytokinin-regulated genes that modulate plant immunity. In addition, out of miRNAs that are differently expressed in SV-exposed plants, miRNA397b up-regulates lignification-related genes leading to cell wall reinforcement. Taken together, my study provides new insight into sound-elicited regulation of secondary metabolites, hormone, and cell wall against R. solanacearum through the epigenetic dynamics with regard to directing transcriptional re-programming.