《BAK1 Directly Regulates Brassinosteroid Perception and BRI1 Activation》.pdfVIP

Journal of Integrative Plant Biology 2013, 55 (12): 1264– 1270 Invited Expert Review BAK1 Directly Regulates Brassinosteroid Perception and BRI1 Activation Kai He, Shengbao Xu and Jia Li* Ministry of Education Key Laboratory of Cell Activities and Stress Adaptations, School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China Corresponding author Tel/Fax: þ86 931 891 5662; E‐mail: lijia@ Articles can be viewed online without a subscription. Available online on 28 October 2013 at and /journal/jipb doi: 10.1111/jipb.12122 Abstract Plants utilize plasma membrane‐localized receptor‐like kinases (RLKs) to sense extracellular signals to coordinate growth, development, and innate immune responses. BAK1 regulates multiple signaling pathways acting as a co‐receptor of several distinct ligand‐binding RLKs. It has been debated whether BAK1 serves as an essential regulatory component or only a signal amplifier without pathway specificity. This issue has been clarified recently. Genetic and structural analyses indicated that BAK1 and its homologs play indispensible roles in mediating brassinosteroid (BR) signaling pathway by directly perceiving the ligand BR and Jia Li activating the receptor of BR, BRI1. The mechanism revealed by these studies now (Corresponding author) serves as a paradigm for how a pair of RLKs can function together in ligand binding and subsequent initiation of signaling. Keywords: Arabidopsis; BAK1; brassinosteroid; BRI1;