Category: Blog

Moving around taught me two essential skills, only one being relevant here: how to put up wallpaper, and how critical it is to label boxes to help the moving company drop them at their intended location. Now think of a cell: the boxes are vesicles, their contents are proteins and metabolites, and the…

Zhi Li, Andan Zhu, et al. compare inbred and hybrid lines to explore how daily changes in metabolic pathways affect hybrid vigor. The Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.20.00320  Background: Heterosis or hybrid vigor refers to the superior growth or fitness in the hybrid progeny compared to one…

Liu et al., generate a novel collection of mutants impaired in PI3P biosynthesis and discovered new features and functions of this phosphoinositide in intracellular trafficking. The Plant Cell (2020). https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.20.00285 By Richard S. Marshall and Richard D. Vierstra, Washington University,…

Lignin is a major functional component of plant secondary cell walls and the second most abundant biological polymer on Earth after cellulose. Understanding the biosynthesis of lignin has huge practical implications because lignin is a major by-product of processes that use cellulosic biomass for industrial…

Charles Copeland1 1Department of Plant Microbe Interactions, Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, 50829 Cologne, Germany ORCID: 0000-0001-8535-8615 copeland@mpipz.mpg.de   As plants grow, they produce new organs such as leaves, lateral roots, and flowers. Plant development…

Creating Crops for the Future: Challenges, Technology, and Sustainable Solutions A special event hosted by Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Translational Photosynthesis and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Plant Energy Biology Recorded November 11, 11…

Castillejo et al. describe how independent mutations in the transcription factor MYB10 drive natural variation in strawberry color. The Plant Cell (2020) https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.20.00474  By Cristina Castillejo and Iraida Amaya Instituto Andaluz de Investigación y Formación Agraria y Pesquera…

Sweet ripe strawberries (Fragaria spp.) come in colors ranging from deep burgundy to white and everything in between. Such variation attracts consumers and gardeners alike, making fruit color an important breeding target. Strawberry fruit receptacles vary in color due to different levels of anthocyanins.…