Unveiling the multifaceted roles of crop secondary metabolites: From quality enhancement and stress resilience to molecular regulation and precision improvement.
Li H, Yan H, Zhao Y, Xiao Q, Chen N
Crop Improvement
Those bitter compounds in your homegrown kale that intensify after a frost aren't accidental — they're the plant's stress response, and understanding them could help gardeners and farmers grow more resilient food with fewer pesticides.
Plants make thousands of chemicals beyond basic sugars and proteins — things like the antioxidants in blueberries, the spice in hot peppers, or the bitterness in broccoli. These compounds help plants fight off insects, survive heat and drought, and even taste better to us. Scientists are now mapping the genetic switches that control when and where these chemicals are made, with the goal of breeding crops that are tougher, more nutritious, and less dependent on chemical sprays.
Key Findings
Secondary metabolites serve dual roles: improving crop sensory and nutritional quality for humans while simultaneously defending plants against biotic stresses (pathogens, insects) and abiotic stresses (drought, heat, salinity).
Multiple regulatory layers — including biosynthetic enzymes, transcription factors, noncoding RNAs, and epigenetic modifications — coordinate secondary metabolite production, but how these interact under combined real-world stress conditions remains poorly understood.
Advanced biotechnological tools (including precision genetic approaches) hold transformative potential for manipulating secondary metabolite pathways to stabilize crop yields and improve quality under climate change scenarios.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Plants produce thousands of natural compounds that do far more than make food taste good — they help crops survive drought, disease, and pests while also boosting nutrition. This review maps out how those compounds are made, regulated, and how scientists can engineer crops to produce more of them.
Abstract Preview
Crops are fundamental to global food security, yet their production and quality are increasingly challenged by climate change, resource limitations, and both biotic and abiotic stresses. Secondary ...
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