Abstract
BACKGROUND: Plant growth depends on the integration of environmental signals and nutrient availability. Under stress conditions, growth is often attenuated to prioritise defense, creating a trade-off between growth and stress responses. Autophagy, a conserved degradation and recycling mechanism in eukaryotes, plays a central role in maintaining cellular homeostasis during stress. Enhancing autophagy has been shown to improve growth, yield, and stress tolerance in plants, yet the molecular triggers that initiate this process are not fully understood. RESULTS: We identified raffinose, a plant-derived sugar associated with stress responses, as a novel inducer of autophagy in plants. Exogenous application of raffinose stimulated autophagic activity and promoted biomass accumulation and seed yield in an autophagy-dependent manner across multiple plant species. Mechanistic analysis revealed that raffinose activates autophagy through SnRK1 in a TOR-independent manner, and that it upregulates the expression of autophagy-related genes ATG5 and ATG7. The growth-promoting effect of raffinose was specific and not replicated by equivalent carbon supplementation with glucose, while the raffinose precursor galactinol showed similar autophagy-dependent growth enhancement. Finally, we pointed to possible downstream candidates operating autophagy-related biomass accumulation, as identified by metabolic profiling. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings position raffinose as a signalling molecule capable of activating autophagy and enhancing plant growth and yield in a targeted, species-conserved manner. By linking a stress-associated sugar to the activation of a central catabolic pathway, this work reveals a potential mechanism by which plants may optimise the balance between growth and defense. Understanding raffinose-mediated autophagy induction can potentially provide new opportunities for developing strategies to improve crop performance under variable environmental conditions.
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Claims 8
Claim · model-written summary
Raffinose induced autophagy.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis Thaliana
Arabidopsis thalianat0 - Treatment
- Exogenous application of raffinosee0
- Outcome
- autophagic activitye0
- Direction
- stimulatede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Exogenous application of raffinose stimulated autophagic activity”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Raffinose increased biomass in an autophagy-dependent manner.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Treatment
- Exogenous application of raffinosee0
- Outcome
- biomass accumulatione0
- Direction
- promotede0
- Qualifier
- in an autophagy-dependent mannere0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Exogenous application of raffinose stimulated autophagic activity and promoted biomass accumulation and seed yield in an autophagy-dependent manner across multiple plant species.”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Raffinose promoted seed yield in an autophagy-dependent manner.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Treatment
- raffinosee0
- Outcome
- seed yielde0
- Direction
- promotede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Exogenous application of raffinose stimulated autophagic activity and promoted biomass accumulation and seed yield in an autophagy-dependent manner across multiple plant species.”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Raffinose activated autophagy through SnRK1 independently of TOR.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Gene
- SnRK1e0
- Outcome
- autophagye0
- Qualifier
- TOR-independent mannere0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“raffinose activates autophagy through SnRK1 in a TOR-independent manner”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Raffinose upregulated ATG5 and ATG7 expression.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Treatment
- raffinosee0
- Gene
- ATG5 and ATG7e0
- Outcome
- expression of autophagy-related genes ATG5 and ATG7e0
- Direction
- upregulatese0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Mechanistic analysis revealed that raffinose activates autophagy through SnRK1 in a TOR-independent manner, and that it upregulates the expression of autophagy-related genes ATG5 and ATG7.”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Glucose supplementation did not reproduce the growth effect.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Treatment
- equivalent carbon supplementation with glucosee0
- Outcome
- growth-promoting effecte0
- Direction
- not replicatede0
- Comparator
- raffinosee0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“The growth-promoting effect of raffinose was specific and not replicated by equivalent carbon supplementation with glucose”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Galactinol produced a similar autophagy-dependent growth response.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Treatment
- galactinole0
- Outcome
- growth enhancemente0
- Direction
- similare0
- Qualifier
- autophagy-dependente0
- Comparator
- raffinosee0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“the raffinose precursor galactinol showed similar autophagy-dependent growth enhancement.”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
Claim · model-written summary
Metabolic profiling identified possible downstream candidates for biomass accumulation.
- Taxon
- Arabidopsis ThalianaArabidopsis thalianat0
- Outcome
- possible downstream candidates operating autophagy-related biomass accumulatione0
- Qualifier
- as identified by metabolic profilinge0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“possible downstream candidates operating autophagy-related biomass accumulation, as identified by metabolic profiling.”
t0“Arabidopsis Thaliana”
The same questions in other papers
glucose · growth · Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress)Positive and negative results
1 paper in the same direction as this paper · 5 reporting no difference from an alternative
- positive
- positive
- positive
3 papers more in this group
See all 7 papers →raffinose · growth · Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress)Results agree
1 paper in the same direction as this paper
- positive
Claims are grouped by organism, treatment and what was measured or targeted. A paper counts as positive when any of its claims in the group is positive.