Complexity of the transcriptional network controlling secondary wall biosynthesis

Secondary walls in the form of wood and fibers are the most abundant biomass produced by vascular plants, and are important raw materials for many industrial uses. Understanding how secondary walls are constructed is of significance in basic plant biology and also has far-reaching implications in genetic engineering of plant biomass better suited for various end uses, such as biofuel production. Secondary walls are composed of three major biopolymers, i.e., cellulose, hemicelluloses and lignin, the biosynthesis of which requires the coordinated transcriptional regulation of all their biosynthesis genes. Genomic and molecular studies have identified a number of transcription factors, whose expression is associated with secondary wall biosynthesis. We comprehensively review how these secondary wall-associated transcription factors function together to turn on the secondary wall biosynthetic program, which leads to secondary wall deposition in vascular plants. The transcriptional network regulating secondary wall biosynthesis employs a multi-leveled feed-forward loop regulatory structure, in which the top-level secondary wall NAC (NAM, ATAF1/2 and CUC2) master switches activate the second-level MYB master switches and they together induce the expression of downstream transcription factors and secondary wall biosynthesis genes. Secondary wall NAC master switches and secondary wall MYB master switches bind to and activate the SNBE (secondary wall NAC binding element) and SMRE (secondary wall MYB-responsive element) sites, respectively, in their target gene promoters. Further investigation of what and how developmental signals trigger the transcriptional network to regulate secondary wall biosynthesis and how different secondary wall-associated transcription factors function cooperatively in activating secondary wall biosynthetic pathways will lead to a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying the transcriptional control of secondary wall biosynthesis.