Epigenetics mechanism, stress memory, and transgenerational epigenetic inheritance in plant responses to climate-relevant stressors

The field of plant epigenetics is increasingly recognized for its crucial role in mediating plant responses to diverse environmental stressors intensified by climate change, such as heat, drought, salinity, flooding, and biotic pressures. Plants demonstrate remarkable plasticity and resilience, with mounting evidence implicating epigenetic processes - DNA methylation, histone modifications, chromatin remodeling, and non-coding RNAs - as critical regulators of gene expression and phenotypic outcomes associated with “stress memory”. Recent research suggests that some of these molecular marks can be inherited across generations, linking parental environments to offspring phenotypes in the absence of direct genetic change. Despite this progress, the field faces several conceptual and technical challenges. Many reports of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance (TEI) are confounded by parental environmental effects, seed provisioning, microbiome transmission, or incomplete disentanglement of genetic and epigenetic causes. Furthermore, the highly dynamic and context-dependent nature of plant epigenomes, especially their reprogramming during gametogenesis and embryogenesis, has fueled debate over the true persistence and adaptive significance of these marks. The latest studies continue to reveal both instances of stable stress-induced epigenetic inheritance and limits imposed by developmental resetting, but rigorous standards and methodologies are still emerging.This Research Topic aims to drive mechanistic clarity and methodological rigor in uncovering how stress-induced epigenetic regulation and memory operate in plants, particularly under climate-relevant stress regimes. It seeks to define and interrogate the molecular pathways by which stress experiences can be encoded, maintained, or erased across plant generations. Core aims include elucidating when and how epigenetic states persist through cycles of development and inheritance, establishing gold-standard evidence criteria for TEI, and critically evaluating the stability versus reversibility of epigenetic marks. Additional objectives target the advancement of methodological best practices - spanning study design, analytical approaches, and data sharing - to enhance reproducibility, comparability, and causal insight across the plant epigenomics community.The scope of this Research Topic is focused on fundamental mechanisms and dynamic processes underpinning stress memory and epigenetic inheritance in plants, explicitly excluding studies centered primarily on translational breeding pipelines or field protocols lacking mechanistic or epigenomic depth. Contributions should probe mechanistic, developmental, and methodological questions rather than simply report applied trait engineering or marker discovery. To gather further insights in these boundaries, we welcome articles addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:• Mechanistic pathways underpinning stress-induced epigenetic regulation and heritable memory, including DNA and histone modification systems, small RNA biology, and chromatin architecture• Epigenome dynamics and reprogramming during plant gametogenesis, embryogenesis, and early development, with attention to tissue and cell lineage specificity• Experimental designs, statistical controls, and evidence standards crucial for distinguishing true TEI from confounding factors such as parental environment, seed effects, microbiome, and genetic linkage• Evaluations of the context dependence, persistence, and reversibility of epigenetic marks across environmental scenarios, genetic backgrounds, tissues, and generations• Methodological advances in plant epigenomics, including improved experimental pipelines, integrative analyses, reproducibility standards, and data sharing best practices.Article types encouraged for submission include Original Research (with a mechanistic, epigenomic, and/or rigorous inheritance focus), Methods/Technology Reports (causal inference tools or TEI testing improvements), Reviews/Mini-Reviews (on mechanisms, reprogramming, or TEI evidence criteria), and Perspectives/Opinions (definitions and reproducibility frameworks). Topic editors: Saurabh Chaudhary, Praveen Guleria Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/77093/epigenetics-mechanism-stress-memory-and-transgenerational-epigenetic-inheritance-in-plant-responses-to-climate-relevant-stressors