背景回顾：Drought and salt stresses impose major constraints on soybean production worldwide. 

提出问题：However, improving agronomically valuable soybean traits under drought conditions can be challenging due to trait complexity and multiple factors that influence yield.

主要发现：Here, we identified a nuclear factor Y C subunit (NF-YC) family transcription factor member, GmNF-YC14, which formed a heterotrimer with GmNF-YA16 and GmNF-YB2 to activate the GmPYR1-mediated abscisic acid (ABA) signalling pathway to regulate stress tolerance in soybean. 

结果1-功能缺失突变体：Notably, we found that CRISPR/Cas9-generated GmNF-YC14 knockout mutants were more sensitive to drought than wild-type soybean plants. 

结果2-过表达：Furthermore, field trials showed that overexpression of GmNF-YC14 or GmPYR1 could increase yield per plant, grain plumpness, and stem base circumference, thus indicating improved adaptation of soybean plants to drought conditions. 

结论：Taken together, our findings expand the known functional scope of the NF-Y transcription factor functions and raise important questions about the integration of ABA signalling pathways in plants. Moreover, GmNF-YC14 and GmPYR1 have potential for application in the improvement of drought tolerance in soybean plants.

 摘 要 

干旱和盐胁迫是全球范围内大豆产量的主要限制性因素。然而，由于性状的复杂性以及影响大豆产量的因素众多，提升大豆在胁迫环境下的产量十分困难。本文中，作者鉴定到了一个核因子Y C 亚基NF-YC家族转录因子GmNF-YC14，该蛋白会和GmNF-YA16以及GmNF-YB2形成一个异源三聚体，激活GmPYR1介导的脱落酸信号转导途径，从而调控大豆的胁迫响应。尤其是，作者发现通过CRISPR/Cas9技术获得的GmNF-YC14敲除突变体对于干旱的敏感性要比野生型更高。此外，田间试验显示GmNF-YC14基因或者GmPYR1基因的过表达能够增加单株的产量、籽粒饱满度和茎基周长，因此表明其对于大豆适应干旱条件的促进作用。综上，本文的研究拓宽了我们对于NF-Y转录因子功能的认知，提出了植物中有关ABA信号转导整合的重要问题。此外，GmNF-YC14和GmPYR1基因在大豆植株抗旱育种改良方面具有潜在的应用前景。