Papain-like cysteine proteases are involved in programmed cell death in plants under heavy metal stress

摘要

Programmed cell death (PCD) plays a crucial role in plant development (dPCD) and is also activated under the influence of environmental factors (ePCD). As the mechanism of PCD under heavy metal stress is poorly understood, a suspension culture of cells from the facultative metallophyte Viola tricolor was used as a model to study the role of caspase-like proteases in PCD in plant cells under heavy metal stress.