Sugar suppresses cell death caused by disruption of fumarylacetoacetate hydrolase in Arabidopsis

Main conclusion Sugar negatively regulates cell death resulting from the loss of fumarylacetoacetate hydrolase that catalyzes the last step in the Tyr degradation pathway in Arabidopsis . Fumarylacetoacetate hydrolase (FAH) hydrolyzes fumarylacetoacetate to fumarate and acetoacetate, the final step in the tyrosine (Tyr) degradation pathway that is essential to animals. Previously, we first found that the Tyr degradation pathway plays an important role in plants. Mutation of the SSCD1 gene encoding FAH in Arabidopsis leads to spontaneous cell death under short-day conditions. In this study, we presented that the lethal phenotype of the short-day sensitive cell death1 (sscd1) seedlings was suppressed by sugars including sucrose, glucose, fructose, and maltose in a dose-dependent manner. Real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) analysis showed the expression of Tyr degradation pathway genes homogentisate dioxygenase and maleylacetoacetate isomerase, and sucrose-processing genes cell-wall invertase 1 and alkaline/neutral invertase G, was up-regulated in the sscd1 mutant, however, this up-regulation could be repressed by sugar. In addition, a high concentration of sugar attenuated cell death of Arabidopsis wild-type seedlings caused by treatment with exogenous succinylacetone, an abnormal metabolite resulting from the loss of FAH in the Tyr degradation pathway. These results indicated that (1) sugar could suppress cell death in sscd1, which might be because sugar supply enhances the resistance of Arabidopsis seedlings to toxic effects of succinylacetone and reduces the accumulation of Tyr degradation intermediates, resulting in suppression of cell death; and (2) sucrose-processing genes cell-wall invertase 1 and alkaline/neutral invertase G might be involved in the cell death in sscd1. Our work provides insights into the relationship between sugar and sscd1-mediated cell death, and contributes to elucidation of the regulation of cell death resulting from the loss of FAH in plants.