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Role of Brassinosteroids in the Plant Response to Drought: Do We Know Anything for Certain?

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Book cover Brassinosteroids: Plant Growth and Development

Abstract

Brassinosteroids (BRs) are considered to be major players in the plant response to unfavourable conditions. They have been reported to alleviate stress symptoms and to enhance plant tolerance to various abiotic and biotic stressors including drought. However, our current knowledge of the role of BRs in the plant drought response should perhaps be limited only to the statement that the treatment of plants with BRs can mitigate the negative effects of this stress factor. No clear conclusions on the role of these phytohormones in the plant drought response should be inferred from the currently available data, because the results of BR/drought studies often differ quite substantially. This chapter attempts to provide a critical evaluation of the information available on this topic, i.e., data obtained either from plants treated with exogenously applied BRs or mutants in BR biosynthesis/perception. The existing studies are considered from several viewpoints regarding important aspects of their experimental design and attention is also drawn to some of their shortcomings. The question of whether BRs truly function as specific regulators of drought-induced response or whether the observed effects of BRs on drought-stressed plants are of a more general character remains unanswered.

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  1. Department of Genetics and Microbiology, Faculty of Science, Charles University, Prague, CZ, Czech Republic

    Dana Hola

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  1. Department of Botany, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, India

    Shamsul Hayat

  2. Biology Department, United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

    Mohammad Yusuf

  3. Department of Botanical & Environmental Sciences, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab, India

    Renu Bhardwaj

  4. Department of Plant Biochemistry & Toxicology, University of Bialystok, Ciolkowskiego, Poland

    Andrzej Bajguz

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Hola, D. (2019). Role of Brassinosteroids in the Plant Response to Drought: Do We Know Anything for Certain?. In: Hayat, S., Yusuf, M., Bhardwaj, R., Bajguz, A. (eds) Brassinosteroids: Plant Growth and Development. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-6058-9_5

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