Reactive Oxygen, Nitrogen, Carbonyl and Sulfur Species and Their Roles in Plant Abiotic Stress Responses and Tolerance

Plants being sessile organisms are often exposed to various abiotic stress conditions, which greatly hamper the growth, yields as well as the quality of produce. Plants respond to abiotic stresses in an exceptionally complex and coordinated manner, involving the interactions and crosstalk with many metabolic-molecular pathways. One of the most common responses is generation of reactive chemical species including reactive oxygen species (ROS), reactive nitrogen species (RNS), reactive carbonyl species (RCS) and reactive sulfur species (RSS). ROS and RNS have long attracted attention from the plant researchers for both their damaging as well as protective effects. However, several reports are emerging to confirm similar roles played by the relatively newer 'reactive' members, the RCS and RSS. Plant reactive species are also hailed as vivacious signaling molecules that play regulatory roles in many plant metabolic procedures. Undeniably, these reactive species are involved in virtually all aspects of plant cell functions. Reactive species and the antioxidant machinery maintain a delicate but critical cellular redox-balance which gets disturbed under stress conditions, where their biosynthesis, transportation, scavenging and the overall metabolism gets decisive for plant survival. The current review aims to highlight and discuss the role of ROS, RNS, RCS, and RSS in plants especially under abiotic stresses, cross-talks between them, current approaches and technological advents for their characterization, and a perspective view on exploration/manipulation of the pathways and check-points involved in biosynthesis, transport and scavenging of these reactive species for engineering abiotic stress tolerant crop plants.