Herbicide response through retrotransposon-mediated environmentally-sensitive epigenetic regulation of FLC in Arabidopsis

The mobilization of retrotransposons yields major-effect mutations. Here, we report an adaptive retrotransposon insertion within the first intron of the Arabidopsis floral-repressor locus FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC). The insertion-mutation augments the environmental sensitivity of FLC by affecting the balance between coding and non-coding transcript isoforms in response to environmental threads. We show that this balance is modulated epigenetically by DNA methylation and orchestrated by IBM2, a factor involved in the processing of intronic heterochromatin. The stress-sensitive allele of FLC has recently spread across populations subjected to recurrent chemical weeding, and we demonstrate that retrotransposon-driven acceleration of life cycle represents a rapid response to herbicide. Our findings illustrate how retrotransposition can create environmentally-sensitive alleles that facilitate adaptation to anthropogenic disturbances of the environment.