ABSTRACT

Over the course of the past several years we have developed a high-throughput screening protocol to isolate stress signal transduction mutants in the plant

Arabidopsis thaliana

using luciferase imaging with a charge-coupled device (CCD) camera. This method involves using plants containing the firefly luciferase gene fused with different promoters from genes involved in cold temperature stress, osmotic stress, abscisic acid response, or in general stress perception. The system works by inducing the promoter-luciferase fusions by various environmental perturbations and recording the amount of light from luciferase-catalyzed reactions with a CCD camera. The level of luminescence is an indication of plant responsiveness to the treatment.