Plant annexins and their involvement in stress responses

Annexins, which form an evolutionarily conserved family of proteins are known to be involved in important biological processes such as membrane trafficking, cytoskeletal organization, cellular homeostasis and ion transport. They are widely known for mediating plant stress responses. Although, the mechanism involved in these responses is not deciphered clearly, several recent attempts in this direction have strengthened our understanding of the different components involved in annexin-mediated stress responses in plants, which prompted us to link and hypothesize their involvement in stress alleviation by predicting a possible relation with different elements participating in stress signaling. In the light of past and present findings, we discuss the structural and cellular properties of plant annexins emphasizing their stress-mediated roles and propose an annexin-mediated signaling cascade in this review, which has not been dealt with earlier. Annexin participation in diverse cellular functions highlight their essential role in plant growth and development and also their importance in crop improvement programs for enhancing multiple stress tolerance.