Abstract
The endosomal sorting complex required for transport (ESCRT) machinery has been well documented for its function in endosomal sorting in eukaryotes. Here, we demonstrate an up-to-now unknown and non-endosomal function of the ESCRT component in plants. We show that FYVE DOMAIN PROTEIN REQUIRED FOR ENDOSOMAL SORTING 1 (FREE1), a recently identified plant-specific ESCRT component essential for multivesicular body biogenesis, plays additional functions in the nucleus in transcriptional inhibition of abscisic acid (ABA) signalling. Following ABA treatment, SNF1-related protein kinase 2 (SnRK2) kinases phosphorylate FREE1, a step requisite for ABA-induced FREE1 nuclear import. In the nucleus, FREE1 interacts with the basic leucine zipper transcription factors ABA-RESPONSIVE ELEMENTS BINDING FACTOR4 and ABA-INSENSITIVE5 to reduce their binding to the cis-regulatory sequences of downstream genes. Collectively, our study demonstrates the crosstalk between endomembrane trafficking and ABA signalling at the transcriptional level and highlights the moonlighting properties of the plant ESCRT subunit FREE1, which has evolved unique non-endosomal functions in the nucleus besides its roles in membrane trafficking in the cytoplasm.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding authors on reasonable request.
Change history
20 July 2021
A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-021-00984-0
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31671467 and 31870171), the China 1000-Talents Plan for young researchers (C83025) to C.G., the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31701246) to W.S., the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2018M630963) and the National Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (2018A030310505) to C.Y., the National Natural Science Foundation of China (91854201) and the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (C4011-14R, C4012-16E, C4002-17G and AoE/M-05/12) to L.J. We thank H. Deng for her assistance on the EMSA experiments.
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H.L., Y.L., Q.Z. and C.G. designed the project. H.L., Y.L., Q.Z., T.L., J.W., B.L. and Y.Z. performed the experiments. H.L., Y.L., Q.Z., W.S., C.Y., P.L.R., Y.Z., L.J., X.W. and C.G. analysed the results. H.L., Q.Z., R.L.R., L.J., X.W. and C.G. wrote the manuscript.
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Li, H., Li, Y., Zhao, Q. et al. The plant ESCRT component FREE1 shuttles to the nucleus to attenuate abscisic acid signalling. Nat. Plants 5, 512–524 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-019-0400-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-019-0400-5
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