title: Novel links in the plant TOR kinase signaling network.
abstract: Nutrient and energy sensing and signaling mechanisms constitute the most ancient and fundamental regulatory networks to control growth and development in all life forms. The target of rapamycin (TOR) protein kinase is modulated by diverse nutrient, energy, hormone and stress inputs and plays a central role in regulating cell proliferation, growth, metabolism and stress responses from yeasts to plants and animals. Recent chemical, genetic, genomic and metabolomic analyses have enabled significant progress toward molecular understanding of the TOR signaling network in multicellular plants. This review discusses the applications of new chemical tools to probe plant TOR functions and highlights recent findings and predictions on TOR-mediate biological processes. Special focus is placed on novel and evolutionarily conserved TOR kinase effectors as positive and negative signaling regulators that control transcription, translation and metabolism to support cell proliferation, growth and maintenance from embryogenesis to senescence in the plant system.
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200032, PR China.
authors.forename: Yan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Xiong
authors.affiliation: Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, USA; Department of Molecular Biology and Center for Computational and Integrative Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, MA 02114, USA. Electronic address: sheen@molbio.mgh.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Jen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sheen
mesh_terms: D018521:Plant Physiological Phenomena; D010940:Plant Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D015398:Signal Transduction; D058570:TOR Serine-Threonine Kinases / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D010940:Plant Proteins; D058570:TOR Serine-Threonine Kinases