Implication of Phytohormonal Signaling and Their Molecular Cross Talk During Disease Resistance in Plants

A plant must deal with biotic and abiotic stress in nature; therefore, a plant’s reactions to its surroundings must be balanced and coordinated. Moreover, a plant that can withstand biotic or abiotic stress shouldn’t experience any negative effects on its ability to grow, develop, or produce. The analysis of the hormone response and the involvement of TFs are complicated by the various regulatory mechanisms that are integrated at several different levels, especially in the case of a pathogen attack. Disease resistance has been demonstrated in transgenic plants that constitutively produce specific hormones. However, such a strong resistance response is known to have implications in the form of altered development, including normal autonomic and reproductive health parameters. Without any threat, investing time and energy in defense would obstruct development. To prevent resource loss in the absence of stress and lessen the chance that prospective assailants would figure out how to counteract the plants’ biochemical defense system, plants evolved a hormone-based defensive mechanism. Plants that have been primed are more receptive to future pathogen assaults. Priming is a comparatively low-cost defense tactic since resources are only used when the threat resurfaces. Moreover, unprimed plants treated with low, ineffective doses of defensive hormones perform worse under pathogen attack than primed plants. Although transgenerational priming has been shown to occur in numerous plants, the priming demonstrates similarities to transgenerational defense in plants. Due to the progress in biotechnology research and development, researchers can now utilize molecular and genetic engineering techniques for crop improvement, surpassing traditional crop breeding approaches. Similarly, the manipulation or alteration of genes involved in biosynthesis and their signaling mechanisms, particularly in addressing biotic stress, holds the potential to safeguard economically vital crops in the face of achanging climate. For this, a complete understanding of phytohormone signaling mechanisms is required to modify the activity of phytohormones during stress. Similarly, future research should focus on utilizing the studies and results associated with phytohormones obtained in the model plants in the economically important crops at the field level and their corresponding trade-off in terms of their overall growth and development including their physiological aspects. Therefore, a molecular understanding of hormone balance is required to alter hormone homeostasis and use it as a weapon for effective pathogen control in the field of agriculture.