Transcriptional regulation of oil biosynthesis in seed plants: current understanding, applications and perspectives

Abstract

Plants produce and accumulate triacylglycerol (TAG) in their seeds as an energy reservoir to support the processes of seed germination and seedling development. Plant seed oils are vital not only for human diets but also as renewable feedstock for industrial uses. TAG biosynthesis consists of two major steps: de novo fatty acid biosynthesis in the plastids and TAG assembly in the endoplasmic reticulum. The latest advances in unraveling transcriptional regulation have shed light on the molecular mechanisms of plant oil biosynthesis. This review summarizes the recent progress in understanding the regulatory mechanisms of well-characterized and newly discovered transcription factors and other types of regulators that control plant fatty acid biosynthesis. The emerging picture shows that plant oil biosynthesis responds to developmental and environmental cues that stimulate a network of interacting transcriptional activators and repressors, which, in turn, fine-tune the spatiotemporal regulation of the pathway genes.