Entries by Mary Williams

Rhamnose-containing cell wall polymers suppress helical plant growth independently of microtubule orientation

Saffer et al. identified an Arabidpsis mutant with swirled petals and with petal epidermal cells that show a left-handed (but never right-handed) twist. They mapped the mutation to the RHAMNOSE BIOSYNTHESIS1 (RHM1) gene, which is most highly expressed in petal epidermal cells and encodes an enzyme that catalyzes the biosynthesis of UDP-L-rhamnose, a component of […]

LAZY1 family contributes to gravity signaling within statocytes and branch angle control of roots and shoots

It’s easy to demonstrate that plants sense gravity, and we also know that statocytes are involved in the perception of gravity. Statocytes are gravity-sensing cells that contain dense starch-containing amyloplasts that move within the cell in the direction of gravity. Differential growth to accommodate a change in gravity orientation involves auxin transport, but the steps […]

Stem parasitic plant Cuscuta australis (dodder) transfers herbivory-induced signals among plants

Parasitic plants such as Cuscuta astralis (dodder) form connections with their host plants through which nutrients and other molecules pass. Using mutant plants and transcriptomic assays, Hettenhausen and Li et al. showed that two or more plants connected by Cuscuta bridges shared information through these bridges. Specifically, when one host plant was wounded or subjected […]

How to Review a Manuscript, from MBoC

A 2011 editorial from the journal Molecular Biology of the Cell (MBoC). Any jackass can trash a manuscript, but it takes good scholarship to create one (how MBoC promotes civil and constructive peer review) http://www.molbiolcell.org/content/22/5/525.long Key points: Review a manuscript only if you can do so objectively Review a manuscript only if you can do […]

Commentary: Salt Tolerance in Crops: Not Only a Matter of Gene Regulation

By Elide Formentin Rice (Oryza sativa), the primary source of calories for more than 2 billion people, is the most sensitive of all cereal crops to soil salinity, which affects more than 20% of irrigated arable land (FAO and ITPS, 2015). Rice paddies are mainly located at the delta of rivers, where they can be […]

What We’re Reading: August 4th

This week’s edition is guest edited by Ian Street. Ian is a plant scientist, the writer and editor of The Quiet Branches Blog, The Resources Editor at The AoB Blog and an Associate Editor at The POSTDOCket and co-host of The Recovering Academic podcast. He can be found on Twitter @IHStreet.   Plant blindness and […]

Life as a Scientist, a Woman’s Perspective | Christine Fleet | TEDxEHC

Published on Apr 28, 2016 How do you juggle a toddler in a research lab? Very carefully. This talk looks at issues facing women (or any caregiver) in scientific careers, along with examples from women who have found ways to be successful as parents and as scientists. As a member of the Biology Department at […]