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© 2025 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Plants have evolved complex mechanisms to cope with diverse abiotic stresses, with the phenylpropanoid pathway playing a central role in stress adaptation. This pathway produces an array of secondary metabolites, particularly polyphenols, which serve multiple functions in plant growth, development, regulating cellular processes, and stress responses. Recent advances in understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying phenylpropanoid metabolism have revealed complex regulatory networks involving MYB transcription factors as master regulators and their interactions with stress signaling pathways. This review summarizes our current understanding of polyphenol-mediated stress adaptations in plants, emphasizing the regulation and function of key phenylpropanoid pathway compounds. We discussed how various abiotic stresses, including heat and chilling stress, drought, salinity, light stress, UV radiation, nanoparticles stress, chemical stress, and heavy metal toxicity, modulate phenylpropanoid metabolism and trigger the accumulation of specific polyphenolic compounds. The antioxidant properties of these metabolites, including phenolic acids, flavonoids, anthocyanins, lignin, and polyphenols, and their roles in reactive oxygen species scavenging, neutralizing free radicals, membrane stabilization, and osmotic adjustment are discussed. Understanding these mechanisms and metabolic responses is crucial for developing stress-resilient crops and improving agricultural productivity under increasingly challenging environmental conditions. This review provides comprehensive insights into integrating phenylpropanoid metabolism with plant stress adaptation mechanisms, highlighting potential targets for enhancing crop stress tolerance through metabolic adjustment.

Details

Title
The Role of Polyphenols in Abiotic Stress Tolerance and Their Antioxidant Properties to Scavenge Reactive Oxygen Species and Free Radicals
Author
Muhammad Junaid Rao  VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Zheng, Bingsong  VIAFID ORCID Logo 
First page
74
Publication year
2025
Publication date
2025
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
20763921
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
3159259289
Copyright
© 2025 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.