https://www.selleckchem.com/screening/fda-approved-drug-library.html Environmental pH is a critical parameter for innumerable chemical reactions, myriad biological processes and all forms of life. The mechanisms that underlie the perception of external pH (pHe) have been elucidated in detail for bacteria, fungi and mammalian cells; however, little information is available on whether and, if so, how pHe is perceived by plants. This is particularly surprising since hydrogen ion activity of the substrate is of paramount significance for plants, governing the availability of mineral nutrients, the structure of the soil microbiome and the composition of natural plant communities. Rapid changes in soil pH require constant readjustment of nutrient acquisition strategies, which is associated with dynamic alterations in gene expression. Referring to observations made in diverse experimental set-ups that unambiguously show that pHe per se affects gene expression, we hypothesize that sensing of pHe in plants is mandatory to prioritize responses to various simultaneously received environmental cues.All crops are the product of a domestication process that started less than 12,000 years ago from one or more wild populations1,2. Farmers selected desirable phenotypic traits (such as improved energy accumulation, palatability of seeds and reduced natural shattering3) while leading domesticated populations through several more or less gradual demographic contractions2,4. As a consequence, the erosion of wild genetic variation5 is typical of modern cultivars, making them highly susceptible to pathogens, pests and environmental change6,7. The loss of genetic diversity hampers further crop improvement programmes to increase food production in a changing world, posing serious threats to food security8,9. Using both ancient and modern seeds, we analysed the temporal dynamics of genetic variation and selection during the domestication process of the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) in the