ResIlienCe tO reCurrent HEaT Stresses in plants – RICOCHETS

Crop production data combined with future climate projections can be used to estimate how production, including crop yield but also quality, will be affected by global changes. However, these trends are based on relationships between average environmental conditions and average plant responses. Because there is increasing evidence that the magnitude and frequency of extreme weather events, such as heat waves, are increasing, there is a need to (1) better understand how recurrent environmental stresses within a season affect plant production and (2) incorporate plant responses to such stresses in crop models. RICOCHETS is based on the strong assumption that plant response to recurrent heat stresses, i.e., the succession of heat stresses events separated by non-stressing ones, may not match the addition of individual responses to each event. According to several studies mainly performed at the physiological and/or molecular levels, this could be explained by several reasons. First, a certain form of plant recovery, which can lead to compensation or even over-compensation, following the stressing period. Second, plants subjected to a first stress can be more resilient or less resilient to a second period of stress because they have been respectively prepared (‘primed’) or too much affected by the first stressing event. Combining a data-driven (knowledge discovery in database) and a concept-driven approach (multi-scale analyses of plant responses during recurrent heat stress sequences imposed at specific stages of plant development), RICOCHETS aims to better understand, model and predict the effects of recurrent heat stresses on plant growth, development and production.