Signatures for conserved phenolic-based acclimation responses to UV in a unicellular algal sister of land plants

Daily UV exposure in the unicellular zygnematophyte Mesotaenium drives acclimation marked by lipid droplet formation and accumulation of chemodiverse coumarin-like derivatives.

• Why it matters: UV is a key terrestrial stress, and understanding how early land-plant relatives acclimated can clarify which molecular and cellular components were conserved.
• What they did: The study exposed Mesotaenium to daily UV irradiance and measured responses using microscopy, untargeted metabolomics, and transcriptomics with global gene expression profiling.
• The result: Long-term UV acclimation in Mesotaenium is linked to phenolic-based molecular building blocks and associated genes, suggesting a conserved chassis underpinning land-plant–related UV responses.

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