Plant secondary metabolites in stress: An overview

Plant secondary metabolites play important role including defense against various biotic and abiotic stresses. According to structure, plant secondary metabolites can be classified into mainly two categories i.e. nitrogen containing and non-nitrogen containing, which include a wide variety of phytochemicals such as glucosinolates, terpenes, alkaloids, terpenoids, flavanoids and phenolics etc. The tissue specific secondary metabolites accumulate at different stages of plant according to need of plant during its entire life cycle. It also helps to study impact of various secondary metabolites in different biotic and abiotic stress condition. In conclusion, recent work unveils the limits of our current functional classification system for plant metabolites. Viewing secondary metabolites as integrated components of metabolic networks that are dynamically shaped by various biotic and abiotic stresses can improve our understanding of plant metabolism.