Molecular Mechanisms of Plant Stress Priming: Biostimulant Action and Transcriptomic Regulation of Abiotic Stress Memory

Abiotic stress biology has emerged as a pivotal field for sustaining crop productivity under climate-induced environmental extremes. Plants exposed to stress conditions such as drought, heat, salinity, or heavy metal toxicity can “remember” prior events, triggering faster and stronger molecular responses upon recurrent challenge—an adaptive phenomenon known as stress priming. Biostimulants including amino acids, humic and salicylic acids, melatonin, and complex polysaccharides can elicit such primed states, yet the underlying molecular mechanisms remain obscure. Research has identified diverse players such as hormonal signalling networks, reactive oxygen species (ROS), antioxidant systems, and epigenetic modifications, but a unified mechanistic framework has yet to be established. Recent advances in transcriptomics, epigenomics, and integrative multi-omics present a powerful opportunity to dissect how these biostimulant-triggered molecular memory systems operate across plant species, closing long-standing knowledge gaps in the regulation of abiotic stress tolerance.This Research Topic aims to elucidate the molecular and regulatory basis of plant stress priming induced by biostimulants. Specifically, it seeks to consolidate mechanistic insights into how diverse priming agents initiate, sustain, and transmit stress memory through transcriptional reprogramming, ROS and hormone crosstalk, and epigenetic modifications. The goal is to integrate evidence from model and crop species, linking pathway-level regulation with adaptive phenotypes, and to promote a holistic understanding of priming networks. By uniting multi-omic perspectives with functional genomics approaches, this Research Topic seeks to establish a coherent picture of biostimulant action, provide testable hypotheses on stress memory inheritance, and guide the design of predictive, environmentally sustainable strategies for crop stress management.To gather further insights within the boundaries of biostimulant-induced abiotic stress priming and its molecular mechanisms, we welcome contributions offering functional, omic-driven, and regulatory perspectives without purely descriptive or agronomic focus.We invite submissions addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:• Transcriptomic and epigenomic reprogramming during biostimulant-induced stress priming• Hormonal and ROS-mediated signalling networks in primed stress adaptation• Multi-omic integration to map gene regulatory networks underpinning memory responses• Cross-species comparisons of biostimulant action and stress memory inheritance• Functional genetic validation of candidate regulators in stress tolerance pathways• Computational and bioinformatic modelling of priming pathways and regulatory nodesWe welcome contributions in the form of Original Research, Reviews, Systematic Reviews, Methods, and Perspectives. Topic editors: Kincső Decsi, Rodrigo A. Contreras Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/81996/molecular-mechanisms-of-plant-stress-priming-biostimulant-action-and-transcriptomic-regulation-of-abiotic-stress-memory