Entries by Linda Palmer

Comparing genes that govern flower development in Petunia and Arabidopsis: Evolution made a mess!

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Morel et al. investigate AP1/SEP/AGL6 MADS-box transcription factor functions in Petunia. Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.19.00162 By Michiel Vandenbussche Background: The ABCE model is a simple genetic model that explains how the different floral organs in the flower (sepals, petals, stamens and carpels) acquire their identity based on the combinatorial action of 4 classes of genes (A,B,C […]

Camelina: A History of Polyploidy, Chromosome Shattering, and Recovery

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Following formation of a polyploid plant, cells need to manage issues such as gene dosage and chromosome pairing/segregation to help the formerly separate genomes get along in the same nucleus. As the genomes adjust, chromosomes may undergo recombination, rearrangements, gene loss, and other perturbations, some severe. In some cases, these perturbations mean extinction, but in […]

Burying your head in the sand: heading belowground to find future targets of selection in roots

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Author: Skelton, Robert Paul [email protected] Institution: Department of Integrative Biology, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, 94720. Burying one’s head in the sand is usually synonymous with avoiding an issue, but in this volume of Plant Physiology Colombi et al. (2019) delve belowground to tackle an important topic in the ongoing quest to improve crop […]

Down the Rabbit Hole: The Hidden World of Gene Regulation Within the Nucleus

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Lee and Bailey-Serres uncover multiple aspects of nuclear and whole-cell epigenetic and post-transcriptional gene regulation in Arabidopsis. Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.19.00463 By T. A. Lee and J. Bailey-Serres Background: Plant cells require oxygen to generate ATP, similar to our own living cells. Cells of dense tissues or flooded organs can experience hypoxia. This situation causes a […]

Introducing CRISPR-TSKO: A Breakthrough in Precision Gene Editing

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An excellent way to explore the function of a gene is to knockout its expression and see what happens. The development of the targeted gene editing system CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) has triggered scores of gene knockout studies. CRISPR is based on a defense system used by prokaryotes against the nucleic acids […]

Tissue-specific Gene Elimination in Plants

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Decaestecker and Buono et al. develop a system for tissue-specific gene knockout to enable phenotypic analysis of context-specific gene function. Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.19.00454 By Ward Decaestecker, Rafael Andrade Buono, Moritz Nowack and Thomas Jacobs Background: As plant molecular geneticists, we work to understand how gene functions shape plant growth and development. Our standard approach to […]

Saffron Red Pigment Is Stored in Vacuoles through Active Transport

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Demurtas et al. developed a high-throughput approach to identifying vacuolar transporters and used it to explore transport of crocins in saffron. Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.19.00193 By Olivia C. Demurtas and Giovanni Giuliano Background: The saffron spice is made of dried stigmas from the plant Crocus sativus. The red color of the spice is due to crocins, […]

The common symbiosis pathway: More common than we thought?

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Cope et al. show how lipochitooligosaccharides produced by the mycorrhizal fungus Laccaria bicolor enhance colonization of Populus roots  Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.18.00676 By Kevin R. Cope, University of Wisconsin–Madison (currently at S. Dakota State Univ.) and Jean-Michel Ané, University of Wisconsin–Madison Background: Most land plants form mutually beneficial associations with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. These fungi develop […]

Different partners, different roles!

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You et al. show that LEUNIG_HOMOLOG Facilitates Jaresponses via interactions with the histone acetyltransferase HAC1 and the Mediator complex coactivator MED25.   Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.19.00115 By Yanrong You and Chuanyou Li, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China Background: Jasmonate (JA) is a lipid-derived plant hormone that regulates plant defense […]