Brief History of Plant NO

Early studies on nitric oxide (NO) in plants began with nitrate reduction research in the 1960s, showing NO involvement in various crops (Fewson and Nicholas 1960). In the 1970s and 1980s, work on air pollution and herbicide responses in species like alfalfa and soybean suggested NO played physiological roles (Bennett and Hill, 1973; Klepper 1979). The field gained momentum in 1998 with studies demonstrating NO as a signalling molecule in plant-pathogen interactions, similar to its role in animals (Durner et al., 1998; Delledonne et al., 1998).

Subsequent research found NO production in various plant systems, often linked to a NOS-like enzyme, despite the absence of a confirmed NOS gene in higher plants. In 1999, peroxisomes (Barroso et al., 1999) and purified nitrate reductase (NR, Yamasaki et al., 1999) were shown to generate NO.

In 2001, it was shown that NO interacts with reactive oxygen species (ROS) during pathogen responses (Delledonne et al., 2001). In 2004, the haemoglobin-NO cycle was proposed to explain NO regulation during hypoxia (Igamberdiev et al., 2004).

Key discoveries in 2005–2006 included NO generation by mitochondria (Planchet et al., 2005) and chloroplasts (Jasid et al., 2006), as well as protein S-nitrosation as a major signalling mechanism in plants (Lindermayr et al., 2005). Meanwhile, plant S-nitrosoglutathione reductase (GSNOR) was reported (Feechan et al., 2005) using plant disease resistance as a basis for the work. This showed that there was a mechanism able to reverse thiol-based covalent changes induced by NO accumulation in cells, showing how signalling in plants cells could be regulated in plants. In 2006, regulation of NO via the haemoglobin-NO cycle was further elaborated (Igamberdiev et al., 2006).

Despite efforts, a true plant NOS has not been identified, though a NOS enzyme was discovered in the alga Ostreococcus tauri in 2010 (Foresi et al., 2010). Later studies (2016) introduced the concept of NO signalling via fatty acid modifications (Mata-Pérez et al., 2016) and described the NR-NOFNiR system for NO production in Chlamydomonas (Chamizo-Ampudia et al., 2016).

More recently, in 2023, nitroxyl (HNO) was proposed as a reactive signalling molecule (Arasimowicz-Jelonek et al., 2023), and in 2024, oxidative NO generation from oximes was reported (López-Gómez et al., 2024), adding further complexity to NO biology in plants. In 2025, sulfite oxidase as a new player in plant NO synthesis has been described in plants (Corpas et al., 2025).

A timeline of the most significant reports in plant research is shown in the Figure (Hancock et al., 2025).

Timeline of significant reports in plant NO research

References

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  • Barroso, J.B., Corpas, F.J., Carreras, A., Sandalio, L.M., Valderrama, R., Palma, J., Lupiánez, J.A. and del Rıo, L.A. Localization of nitric-oxide synthase in plant peroxisomes. Journal of Biological Chemistry 274, 36729-36733 (1999).
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