17
views
0
recommends
+1 Recommend
0 collections
    0
    shares
      • Record: found
      • Abstract: found
      • Article: found
      Is Open Access

      The Role of Polyphenols in Abiotic Stress Response: The Influence of Molecular Structure

      review-article

      Read this article at

      Bookmark
          There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

          Abstract

          Abiotic stressors such as extreme temperatures, drought, flood, light, salt, and heavy metals alter biological diversity and crop production worldwide. Therefore, it is important to know the mechanisms by which plants cope with stress conditions. Polyphenols, which are the largest group of plant-specialized metabolites, are generally recognized as molecules involved in stress protection in plants. This diverse group of metabolites contains various structures, from simple forms consisting of one aromatic ring to more complex ones consisting of large number of polymerized molecules. Consequently, all these molecules, depending on their structure, may show different roles in plant growth, development, and stress protection. In the present review, we aimed to summarize data on how different polyphenol structures influence their biological activity and their roles in abiotic stress responses. We focused our review on phenolic acids, flavonoids, stilbenoids, and lignans.

          Related collections

          Most cited references196

          • Record: found
          • Abstract: found
          • Article: found
          Is Open Access

          Flavonoids: an overview

          Flavonoids, a group of natural substances with variable phenolic structures, are found in fruits, vegetables, grains, bark, roots, stems, flowers, tea and wine. These natural products are well known for their beneficial effects on health and efforts are being made to isolate the ingredients so called flavonoids. Flavonoids are now considered as an indispensable component in a variety of nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, medicinal and cosmetic applications. This is attributed to their anti-oxidative, anti-inflammatory, anti-mutagenic and anti-carcinogenic properties coupled with their capacity to modulate key cellular enzyme function. Research on flavonoids received an added impulse with the discovery of the low cardiovascular mortality rate and also prevention of CHD. Information on the working mechanisms of flavonoids is still not understood properly. However, it has widely been known for centuries that derivatives of plant origin possess a broad spectrum of biological activity. Current trends of research and development activities on flavonoids relate to isolation, identification, characterisation and functions of flavonoids and finally their applications on health benefits. Molecular docking and knowledge of bioinformatics are also being used to predict potential applications and manufacturing by industry. In the present review, attempts have been made to discuss the current trends of research and development on flavonoids, working mechanisms of flavonoids, flavonoid functions and applications, prediction of flavonoids as potential drugs in preventing chronic diseases and future research directions.
            Bookmark
            • Record: found
            • Abstract: found
            • Article: not found

            Structure-antioxidant activity relationships of flavonoids and phenolic acids

            The recent explosion of interest in the bioactivity of the flavonoids of higher plants is due, at least in part, to the potential health benefits of these polyphenolic components of major dietary constituents. This review article discusses the biological properties of the flavonoids and focuses on the relationship between their antioxidant activity, as hydrogen donating free radical scavengers, and their chemical structures. This culminates in a proposed hierarchy of antioxidant activity in the aqueous phase. The cumulative findings concerning structure-antioxidant activity relationships in the lipophilic phase derive from studies on fatty acids, liposomes, and low-density lipoproteins; the factors underlying the influence of the different classes of polyphenols in enhancing their resistance to oxidation are discussed and support the contention that the partition coefficients of the flavonoids as well as their rates of reaction with the relevant radicals define the antioxidant activities in the lipophilic phase.
              Bookmark
              • Record: found
              • Abstract: found
              • Article: found
              Is Open Access

              Flavonoids: biosynthesis, biological functions, and biotechnological applications

              Flavonoids are widely distributed secondary metabolites with different metabolic functions in plants. The elucidation of the biosynthetic pathways, as well as their regulation by MYB, basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH), and WD40-type transcription factors, has allowed metabolic engineering of plants through the manipulation of the different final products with valuable applications. The present review describes the regulation of flavonoid biosynthesis, as well as the biological functions of flavonoids in plants, such as in defense against UV-B radiation and pathogen infection, nodulation, and pollen fertility. In addition, we discuss different strategies and achievements through the genetic engineering of flavonoid biosynthesis with implication in the industry and the combinatorial biosynthesis in microorganisms by the reconstruction of the pathway to obtain high amounts of specific compounds.
                Bookmark

                Author and article information

                Journal
                Plants (Basel)
                Plants (Basel)
                plants
                Plants
                MDPI
                2223-7747
                08 January 2021
                January 2021
                : 10
                : 1
                : 118
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Ruđer Bošković Institute, Bijenička cesta 54, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia; salopek@ 123456irb.hr
                [2 ]Faculty of Science, University of Sarajevo, Zmaja od Bosne 33–35, 71000 Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina; erna.karalija@ 123456gmail.com
                [3 ]Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb, Horvatovac 102a, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia; ivana.sola@ 123456biol.pmf.hr (I.Š.); valerija.vujcic@ 123456biol.pmf.hr (V.V.B.)
                Author notes
                [* ]Correspondence: dsamec@ 123456irb.hr
                Author information
                https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7262-0645
                https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8202-8960
                Article
                plants-10-00118
                10.3390/plants10010118
                7827553
                33430128
                9a1e46ed-3697-453d-bd43-e836d7d2f5bb
                © 2021 by the authors.

                Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

                History
                : 04 December 2020
                : 05 January 2021
                Categories
                Review

                abiotic stress,polyphenols,phenolic acids,flavonoids,stilbenoids,lignans

                Comments

                Comment on this article