The Arabidopsis katamari2 Mutant Exhibits a Hypersensitive Seedling Arrest Response at the Phase Transition from Heterotrophic to Autotrophic Growth

Young seedlings use nutrients stored in the seeds to grow and acquire photosynthetic potential. This process, called seedling establishment, involves a developmental phase transition from heterotrophic to autotrophic growth. Some membrane-trafficking mutants of Arabidopsis thaliana (Arabidopsis), such as the katamari2 (kam2) mutant, exhibit growth arrest during seedling development, with a portion of individuals failing to develop true leaves on sucrose-free solid medium. However, the reason for this seedling arrest is unclear. In this study, we show that seedling arrest is a temporal growth arrest response that occurs not only in kam2 but also in wild-type Arabidopsis; however, the threshold for this response is lower in kam2 than in the wild type. A subset of the arrested kam2 seedlings resumed growth after transfer to fresh sucrose-free medium. Growth arrest in kam2 on sucrose-free medium was restored by increasing the gel concentration of the medium or covering the surface of the medium with a perforated plastic sheet. Wild-type Arabidopsis seedlings were also arrested when the gel concentration of sucrose-free medium was reduced. RNA sequencing revealed that transcriptomic changes associated with the rate of seedling establishment were observed as early as 4 days after sowing. Our results suggest that the growth arrest of both kam2 and wild-type seedlings is an adaptive stress response and is not simply caused by the lack of a carbon source in the medium. This study provides a new perspective on an environmental stress response under unfavorable conditions during the phase transition from heterotrophic to autotrophic growth in Arabidopsis.