Crowdsourcing leverages the inputs, ideas and talents of many people in parallel to achieve a goal. Crowdsourcing or “citizen science” can also be an effective approach for science outreach that engages the public by enabling them to collect and analyze data. Willis et al. have developed and assessed a crowdsourced project in which digitized herbaria […]
Nodules are specialized structures that form symbiotic, nitrogen-fixing associations with rhizobia on some plants including Medicago truncatula. Previous work has shown that auxin signalling is involved in nodule formation. Roy et al. extend this knowledge through the identification of a Medicago gene encoding MtLAX2 that is a functional homologue of the Arabidopsis auxin influx transporter […]
SMAX1 (SUPPRESSOR OF MAX2 1) was identified genetically as a suppressor of the enhanced seed dormancy phenotype of the max2 mutant, which is affected in both strigolactone (SL) and karrikin (KAR) responses (karrikins are smoke-derived germination promoters). SMAX1 is the founding member of an eight-member gene family in Arabidopsis, the SMAX1-LIKE family (SMXL); the encoded […]
The maize shoot comprises modular domains of leaf, subtending shoot tissue, and an intercalary meristem that sits just above the next leaf down. By contrast to eudicot shoots that form a ring of vascular bundles, maize shoot vascular bundles remain as separate bundles, forming a “disordered” atactostele. Tsuda et al. used a reverse-genetic approach to […]
Several transcription-factor encoding genes involved in the transition from vegetative to reproductive growth have been identified. One of these, LEAFY (LFY), is expressed at the flanks of the inflorescence meristem at the site of newly forming floral meristems; loss-of-function lfy mutants produce leaves instead of flowers. APETALA1 (AP1) and CAULIFLOWER (CAL) are related genes expressed […]
NRAMPs are transporters of iron (Fe) and manganese (Mn). The nramp3nramp4 double mutant arrests shortly after germination, due to its inability to remobilize Fe from seed vacuolar stores. Agorio et al. used a genetic approach to identify nns1, a partial suppressor of the growth-arrest phenotype. They mapped nns1 to AtPH1, a gene encoding a pleckstrin-homology […]
Light sheet fluorescence microscopy (LSFM) is a powerful imaging tool; unlike confocal microscopy, which illuminates a sample one small volume at a time, LSFM illuminates a complete optical section at a time, greatly speeding up the imaging process and lowering phototoxic effects. Candeo et al. use close-to-physiological imaging of tip-growing root hairs through the combination […]
The site at which transcription begins is traditionally thought to be determined in the proximal promoter by assembly of the pre-initiation complex just upstream of the transcription start site (TSS). New results from Gallegos and Rose challenge this assumption. Prior studies have shown that the presence of an intron near the TSS can boost transcript […]
Membrane proteins are some of the most interesting cellular proteins, serving as sensors and transducers of diverse signals, yet they also are the most challenging to investigate because they require lipid interactions for proper structure and function. Recently, cell-free expression systems for membrane proteins have been developed that incorporate lipid nanodiscs consisting of membrane scaffold […]