Signalintegration

The plant hormone auxin regulates virtually every aspect of plant growth and development. Auxin acts by binding the F-box protein transport inhibitor response 1 (TIR1) and promotes the degradation of the AUXIN/INDOLE-3-ACETIC ACID (Aux/IAA) transcriptional repressors. Here we show that efficient auxin binding requires assembly of an auxin co-receptor complex consisting of TIR1 and an Aux/IAA protein. Heterologous experiments in yeast and quantitative IAA binding assays using purified proteins showed that different combinations of TIR1 and Aux/IAA proteins form co-receptor complexes with a wide range of auxin-binding affinities. Auxin affinity seems to be largely determined by the Aux/IAA. As there are 6 TIR1/AUXIN SIGNALING F-BOX proteins (AFBs) and 29 Aux/IAA proteins in Arabidopsis thaliana, combinatorial interactions may result in many co-receptors with distinct auxin-sensing properties. We also demonstrate that the AFB5–Aux/IAA co-receptor selectively binds the auxinic herbicide picloram. This co-receptor system broadens the effective concentration range of the hormone and may contribute to the complexity of auxin response.

Auxin regulates most aspects of plant growth and development. The hormone is perceived by the TIR1/AFB family of F-box proteins acting in concert with the Aux/IAA transcriptional repressors. Arabidopsis plants that lack members of the TIR1/AFB family are auxin resistant and display a variety of growth defects. However, little is known about the functional differences between individual members of the family. Phylogenetic studies reveal that the TIR1/AFB proteins are conserved across land plant lineages and fall into four clades. Three of these subgroups emerged before separation of angiosperms and gymnosperms whereas the last emerged before the monocot-eudicot split. This evolutionary history suggests that the members of each clade have distinct functions. To explore this possibility in Arabidopsis, we have analyzed a range of mutant genotypes, generated promoter swap transgenic lines, and performed in vitro binding assays between individual TIR1/AFB and Aux/IAA proteins. Our results indicate that the TIR1/AFB proteins have distinct biochemical activities and that TIR1 and AFB2 are the dominant auxin receptors in the seedling root. Further, we demonstrate that TIR1, AFB2, and AFB3, but not AFB1 exhibit significant posttranscriptional regulation. The microRNA miR393 is expressed in a pattern complementary to that of the auxin receptors and appears to regulate TIR1/AFB expression. However our data suggest that this regulation is complex. Our results suggest that differences between members of the auxin receptor family may contribute to the complexity of auxin response.