Entries by Mary Williams

Review: Rubisco is not really so bad ($) (Plant Cell Environ)

The carbon-fixing enzyme Rubisco (Ribulose‐1,5‐bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase) is much-maligned and has been described as “sluggish” and with “confused specificity”. In this new Review, Bathellier et al. argue that it is “not really so bad”. Their reasoning is that when Rubisco’s catalytic properties are compared to enzymes with related catalytic activities and in relevant physiological conditions, it […]

Red algal Rubisco fails to accumulate in tobacco expressing Griffithsia monilis RbcL and RbcS genes (Plant Direct)

Following up on earlier studies in which they introduced cyanobacterial Rubisco into tobacco, Lin and Hanson endeavoured to introduce into tobacco Rubisco genes from a red alga, which has an unusually high CO2/O2 specificity. Although they were able to demonstrate the presence of the genes and their transcription, the enzyme failed to accumulate, suggesting a […]

Polyamines regulate strawberry fruit ripening by abscisic acid, auxin, and ethylene (Plant Physiol)

Polyamines, which include putrescine [NH2(CH2)4NH2], spermidine [NH2(CH2)4NH(CH2)3NH2], and  spermine [NH2(CH2)3NH(CH2)4NH(CH2)3NH2], are widespread in nature. Although their mechanisms of action remain largely unresolved, they have demonstrated roles in plants ranging from abiotic stress tolerance to fruit ripening. Guo, Wang et al. examined the contributions of polyamines to strawberry fruit ripening. They showed that spermidine levels increase […]

Crosstalk between PTGS and TGS pathways in natural antiviral immunity and disease recovery (Nature Plants)

Viruses are significant pathogens of plants, and we know that plants defend themselves in part through the production of small RNAs (sRNAs) that suppress the virus. The viral pathogens in turn can produce viral supressors of RNA silencing (VSR). Kørner et al. investigated the role of gene silencing (post-trancriptional PTGS and transcriptional TGS) in the […]

Receptor-like cytoplasmic kinase STRK1 mediates salt tolerance in rice via H2O2 homeostasis ($) (Plant Cell)

Salinity is a widespread stressor. Zhou et al. investigated the role of receptor-like kinases (RLKs) in salinity tolerance by identifying RLKs that are transcriptionally upregulated by salt treatment. Candidates were introduced either as overexpression (full-length) or dominant negative (partial) clones, leading to the identification of STRK1 (salt tolerance receptor-like cytoplasmic kinase 1) as a conferring […]

Transcriptome landscape of a bacterial pathogen under plant immunity (PNAS)

Many studies have examined how plants respond transcriptionally to pathogen attack. This study investigates how a bacterial pathogen [Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato DC3000 (Pto)] alters its transcriptome very early in the infection process. To accomplish this, Nobori et al. developed two methods to enrich for rare bacterial transcripts against a much larger number of plant […]

The impacts of phosphorus deficiency on the photosynthetic electron transport chain (Plant Physiol)

Phosphorus deficiency is widespread and can severely limit plant growth.  Carstensen et al. investigated how P deficiency affects photosynthesis in barley. They compared chlorophyll a fluorescence transients (OJIP transients) between P-deficient, sufficient and resupplied plants. They observed depletion in the I-step associated with P deficiency, which is consistent with an inhibition of electron transport to […]

What We’re Reading: March 30th

Commentary. 10KP: A phylodiverse genome sequencing plan Nobody doubts the great insights we have gained about plant diversity and evolution from genome sequencing, but the patchy nature of available genomes within the plant phylogeny remains a problem. Cheng et al. describe the 10KP (10,000 Plants) Genome Sequencing Project, which aims to sequence genomes from every […]