Ecophysiological and molecular processes involved in water stress memory in pea: from gene expression regulation to plant hydromineral nutrition

Climate change induces increasingly frequent periods of water deficits during the crop cycle. These periods of water stress negatively impact the plant, notably by limiting the availability of resources (water, mineral elements) and by limiting carbon fixation by the plant. In this context, several studies highlighted the beneficial effect of “priming” of a first stress on the response to a second stress by the induction of a transcriptional memory. This memory depends on epigenetic modifications implemented during the first stress. These modifications can regulate the expression of genes known as “memory genes” which have been characterized in the aerial parts of Arabidospsis and maize. Ho…