Chinese Bulletin of Botany ›› 2016, Vol. 51 ›› Issue (5): 705-723.DOI: 10.11983/CBB15201

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Calcium/calmodulin-mediated Signal Transduction System in Plants

Houqing Zeng, Yaxian Zhang, Shang Wang, Xiajun Zhang, Huizhong Wang, Liqun Du*   

  1. College of Life and Environmental Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 310036, China
  • Received:2015-11-09 Accepted:2016-03-25 Online:2016-09-01 Published:2016-09-27
  • Contact: Du Liqun
  • About author:

    # Co-first authors

Abstract: Calcium (Ca2+) is an important second messenger in plant responses to diverse cellular and environmental stimuli. Calmodulin (CaM) and calmodulin-like proteins (CMLs) are major Ca2+ sensors to decode Ca2+ signals. Although CaM and CMLs have no enzymatic activity or biochemical functions, they are considered multifunctional regulatory proteins by regulating the activity of various classes of downstream CaM/CML-binding proteins (CBPs) and therefore are involved in multiple cellular processes during plant growth and development and environmental adaptation. In this review, we summarize studies of plant CBPs and their physiological functions, methods for identifying CBPs, mechanisms of CBP regulation by Ca2+/CaMs, and CaM-mediated signal transduction pathways related to protein phosphorylation and dephosphorylation, transcriptional regulation of gene expression, ion transportation, reactive oxygen species metabolism, hormone and phospholipid signals, the possible future directions are also discussed.