How CIRCADIAN CLOCK ASSOCIATED1 RNA stability affects the timing of the internal clock in Arabidopsis plants

CCA1 messenger RNA has a short half-life in red and blue light.

• Circadian clocks in plants help predict and adapt to environmental changes over a 24-hour cycle.
• Light and temperature can entrain the molecular oscillators that regulate circadian rhythms in Arabidopsis.
• Previous findings indicated that light influences the expression of the oscillator gene CCA1.
• In transgenic plants with constant CCA1 expression, CCA1 transcript stability is affected by light conditions.
• CCA1 messenger RNA remains stable in the dark and far-red light but degrades quickly in red and blue light.
• The instability determinants of CCA1 transcripts are likely found in the gene's coding region.

Simplified