Editorial : new insights into salinity sensing, signaling and adaptation in plants

Plants under salt stress require additional energy supply to fuel salt tolerance mechanisms and growth. Bandehagh and Taylor establish that plants must strike a balance between energy supply and demand to maintain growth and development during salt stress. This review (1) summaries how salt stress affects different physiological and biochemical processes altering the abundance of different metabolites that are feeding into regular and alternative respiratory pathways and shunts; (2) critically analyses how these metabolic adjustments might help plants to tolerate the salt better; (3) identifies research gaps; and (4) proposes suggestions for future breeding programs targeting high energy-use efficiency. Farhat et al. studied oxidative phosphorylation of mitochondria by comparing mitochondria purified from the suspension cultures of a halophyte (Cakile maritima) and a closely related glycophyte (Arabidopsis thaliana) plant. The abundance of respiratory supercomplexes (monomeric complex I, dimeric complex III and I + III2 supercomplex) were found to be higher in halophyte mitochondria in comparison with glycophyte, implying the efficient electron transfer from complex I to complex III in halophyte mitochondria. Further, the stability of ATP synthase (complex V) was also found to be higher in the halophyte, suggesting that halophyte mitochondria are better equipped to supply the additional ATP required to support the salt stress response.