Emerging roles of auxin in plant abiotic stress tolerance

Plants are continuously attacked by several biotic and abiotic factors. Among abiotic factors, heat, cold, drought, and salinity are common stresses. Plants produce several hormones as their main weapon in fightback against these stresses. Among these hormones, the role of auxin is well established in regulating plant growth and development at various scales. However, in recent literature, the important role of auxin in abiotic stress tolerance has emerged. Several auxin signalling and transport mutants exhibit heat, drought, and salinity-related phenotypes. Among them, auxin-mediated hypocotyl elongation and root growth in response to increased heat are of importance due to the continuous rise in global temperature. Auxin is also involved in regulating and recruiting specialized metabolites like aliphatic glucosinolate to defend themselves from drought stress. Aliphatic glucosinolate (A-GLS) regulates guard cell closure using auxin, which is independent of the major abiotic stress hormone abscisic acid. This regulatory mechanism serves as an additional layer of guard cell movement to protect plants from drought. Transferring the aliphatic glucosinolate pathway into non-brassica plants such as rice and soybean holds the promise to improve drought tolerance. In addition to these, post-translational modification of auxin signalling components and redistribution of auxin efflux transporters are also playing important roles in drought and salt tolerance and, hence, may be exploited to breed drought-tolerant crops. Also, reactive oxygen species, along with peptide hormone and auxin signalling, are important in root growth under stress. In conclusion, we summarize recent discoveries that suggest auxin is involved in various abiotic stresses.