Keywords
Abstract
Drought is an abiotic environmental stress that has a deleterious effect on plant development, growth, and crop yield worldwide. With the escalation of climate change conditions, understanding the molecular mechanisms involved in plant responses to drought stress will provide vital information for the development of climate-resistant crops. Epigenetic modifications, including DNA methylation, histone modification, and small RNAs, play crucial roles in regulating gene expression without altering the basic DNA sequence. This is a summary of recent advances toward elucidation of epigenetic regulatory mechanisms responsible for drought stress resistance in plants. By performing high-throughput sequencing-based comparative analysis of drought-sensitive and drought-resistant varieties and by employing gene silencing tools, researchers have achieved some breakthroughs in the identification of key epigenetic regulators responsible for modulating drought stress response. We discuss the dynamic epigenetic regulatory networks involved in plant drought tolerance and point to potential epigenetic targets for molecular breeding approaches to improve crop resilience under water-limited conditions.