A team of researchers has reprogrammed certain plant receptors to react to mandipropamid, a human-controlled stimulus, to help plants survive amid drought conditions.

When plants face drought, they naturally produce abscisic acid (ABA), a stress hormone that hampers plant growth and reduces water consumption.

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This stress hormone turns on receptors in plants that close stomata (guard cells) on leaves to reduce water loss in waterless conditions.

"Plants face this intrinsic trade-off between growing and consuming water. There's a need for the plant to coordinate its growth with how much water is available. And plants use a small molecule hormone called abscisic acid to sort of make that signaling occur," said Sean Cutler, a plant biologist from University of California and lead study author.

Cutler's team developed a new version of the ABA receptor which, when exposed to a commonly used fungicide called mandipropamid, responded the same way it typically does to abscisic acid.

The mandipropamid signaled the guard cells surrounding the stomata to close the pores to keep water vapor in, rather than allowing it to escape in exchange for carbon dioxide.

Cutler's team demonstrated that when the reprogrammed plants were sprayed with mandipropamid, the plants effectively survived drought conditions.

They tested the receptors in Arabidopsis, an edible plant in the mustard family widely used in genetic testing. They also saw the receptors work in tomato plants, a crop grown on almost every continent.

Altering the ABA receptor, however, does mean these plants better equipped to handle drought will be genetically modified ones. Some plant scientists claim that by introducing foreign genes into plants, consequences like harmful mutations or the introduction of new pathogens could arise.

Cutler argues the new ABA receptor isn't entirely foreign: they're placing a plant gene back into a plant.

Tagsplant receptor, reprogram plant receptor, drought, abscisic acid, plant stomata, stomata, ABA receptor