Abscisic acid (ABA) is a plant hormone involved in many plant processes – from seed maturation to drought responses. ABA is perceived by intracellular pyrabactin resistance and PYR-like family (PYR/PYL) receptors, counting 14 genes in Arabidopsis, representing the largest family of plant receptors. Although individual PYLs differ in their expression patterns, it is hard to […]
Boron is an essential plant micronutrient with the narrowest optimal range in the soil of any micronutrient. At neutral pH, boron is present as uncharged boric acid, B(OH)3, which can freely penetrate membranes. Boron plays an important role in cross-linking cell wall components, but boron starvation and toxicity affect various metabolic and physiological processes beyond […]
Genome modification is a powerful tool, yet precise genome engineering in plants remains challenging. Miki et al. report on the sequential transformation method for gene targeting in Arabidopsis. The parental plants expressing CRISPR/Cas9 under the egg cell- and early embryo-specific DD45 promoter were transformed with constructs containing (1) a homology-directed repair donor sequence, (2) sgRNA […]
Light is not only a driving force of photosynthesis, but also an important environmental signal. Oh et al. report that a number of light sensing phytochromes are expressed in roots of native tobacco (N. attenuata) at higher levels than in the shoots. The authors investigated the roles of those root phytochromes by grafting light-blind roots […]
Exposure to ultraviolet radiation and numerous other factors can cause mispairing of the nucleotides in the DNA, compromising genome integrity. Luckily, plants employ excision repair systems to recognize and repair such DNA damage. Oztas et al. examined the dynamics of such a repair system by using excision repair-sequencing method (XR-seq) to identify genome-wide excision repair […]
Sensing sugar is important, especially if you are a plant, as it helps you to decide whether to invest it in new tissues, or rather store it for later. Low levels of glucose promote seedling growth, while high concentrations repress the development. Peng et al. discovered that brassinosteroid signaling is playing a crucial role in […]
Plastic plant growth serves them well, as it ensures efficient exploration of the environment. A plant can direct the growth of its roots towards the water, but the mechanisms behind hydrotropism are still to be fully understood. Miao et al. performed a screen of 30 Arabidopsis accessions for altered root hydrotropic responses. The accessions were […]
High-throughput plant phenotyping systems are an excellent tool for analyzing large plant populations, providing better understanding of plant growth, productivity and performance under stress conditions. Unfortunately, high-throughput platforms are also high on costs and limited in their adaptability for specific questions, limiting the use by the researchers. Czedik-Eysenberg et al. presents a PhenoBox/PhenoPipeline, a scalable […]
In order to ensure proper development, plants need to balance cell proliferation and differentiation. Mutation in TSO1 causes disorganization of cell layers, leading to drastic reduction in fertility. A mutagenesis screen for rescue of fertility in the tso1-1 background identified MYB3R1 as major partner of TSO1 in cell organization and cell cycle control. In the […]