Regulation of intercellular small RNA (sRNA)-mediated gene silencing in plants is commonly ascribed to hypothetical mechanisms involving movement channels. In this commentary, I present a complementary, perhaps counter-intuitive view, in which sRNA movement is also crucially regulated by the cell-autonomous silencing machinery found in silencing-emitting, traversed and recipient cells.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals
Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription
$29.99 / 30 days
cancel any time
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$209.00 per year
only $17.42 per issue
Rent or buy this article
Get just this article for as long as you need it
$39.95
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
References
Devers, E. A. et al. Movement and differential consumption of short interfering RNA duplexes underlie mobile RNA interference. Nat. Plants 6, 789–799 (2020).
Skopelitis, D. S. et al. Gating of miRNA movement at defined cell-cell interfaces governs their impact as positional signals. Nat. Commun. 9, 3107 (2018).
Brosnan, C. A. et al. Genome-scale, single-cell-type resolution of microRNA activities within a whole plant organ. EMBO J. 38, e100754 (2019).
Jullien, P. E. et al. Assymetric expression of ARGONAUTES in reproductive tissues. Plant Physiol. https://doi.org/10.1093/plphys/kiab474 (2021).
Brioudes, F. et al. HASTY, the Arabidopsis EXPORTIN5 ortholog, regulates cell-to-cell and vascular microRNA movement. EMBO J. 40, e107455 (2021).
Brosnan, C. A. et al. In planta dynamics, transport-biases and endogenous functions of mobile siRNAs in Arabidopsis. Preprint at bioRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.10.06.463290 (2021).
Melnyk, C. W. et al. Mobile 24 nt small RNAs direct transcriptional gene silencing in the root meristems of Arabidopsis thaliana. Curr. Biol. 21, 1678–1683 (2011).
Re, D. A. et al. CURLY LEAF regulates microRNA activity by controlling ARGONAUTE 1 degradation in plants. Mol. Plant 13, 72–87 (2020).
Zhu, H. et al. Arabidopsis Argonaute10 specifically sequesters miR166/165 to regulate shoot apical meristem development. Cell 145, 242–256 (2011).
Cai, H. et al. Spatiotemporal control of miR398 biogenesis, via chromatin remodeling and kinase signaling, ensures proper ovule development. Plant Cell 33, 1530–1553 (2021).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The author declares no competing interests.
Additional information
Peer review information
Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology thanks the anonymous reviewers for their contribution to the peer review of this work.
Related links
miRoot: https://www.miroot.ethz.ch
Supplementary information
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Voinnet, O. Revisiting small RNA movement in plants. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol 23, 163–164 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41580-022-00455-0
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41580-022-00455-0