Transcriptional Response of Arabidopsis thaliana to Fluctuating Light

Natural-light environments are highly variable. Flexible adjustment between light energy utilization and photoprotection is therefore of vital importance for plant performance and fitness in the field. Short-term reactions to changing light intensity are triggered inside chloroplasts and leaves within seconds to minutes, whereas long-term adjustments proceed over hours and days, integrating multiple signals. While the mechanisms of long-term acclimation to light intensity have been studied by changing constant growth light intensity during the day, responses to fluctuating growth light intensity have rarely been inspected in detail. We performed transcriptome profiling in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) leaves to investigate long-term gene expression responses to fluctuating light (FL). In particular, we examined whether responses differ between young and mature leaves or between morning and at the end of the day. Samples / runs are named according to the following scheme: [CS][EM][48]_X-Y, where C = constant light, S = fluctuating light, E = sampled in the evening, M = sampled in the morning, 4 or 8 refers to sampling the 4th (young) or 8th (old) leaf, X is the biological replicate, and only for runs, Y is the technical replicate.