Lateral roots are secondary root organs arising through the dedifferentiation of inner cell layers in the primary root. Nodules arise through symbiosis with rhizobia bacteria in a certain clade of land plants and they also arise through dedifferentiation. Both lateral roots and nodules are part of the…

The problem with gene expression profiling is that it preferentially reports on the more highly-expressed genes. Capture sequencing uses targeted sequence libraries to pull out transcripts from genes of interest, including lowly expressed genes, so that their signals aren’t overwhelmed. To explore…

Previously, the needle1 (ndl1) maize mutant was identified as showing a variable phenotype mainly affecting the tassel. Here, Liu et al. showed that this variability arises due to its temperature sensitivity, with strongest effects at warmer temperatures. In some cases, the plants arrest before reaching…

Letter. The human health benefits from GM crops If you’ve ever spoken publicly about GM crops, you’ve probably heard people express concern about how eating GM crops might affect their health. Smyth lays out a positive case for the human health benefits of GM crops, which will be a useful resource…

Lignin makes up to 27% of the dry weight of wood and is important structurally as well as serving as an effective carbon sink. Lignin is produced from monolignol precursors that are released into the apoplast and then polymerized. Previous studies have suggested that the monolignols are produced not…

Qingwen Shen, first author of Dual Activities of Plant cGMP-Dependent Protein Kinase and its Roles in Gibberellin Signaling and Salt Stress Current Position: Research assistant in National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University, China Education: Ph.D. in Biochemistry…

Peter Crisp, first author of Variation and inheritance of small RNAs in maize inbreds and F1 hybrids Current Position: Postdoctoral Associate, Springer Lab, Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, University of Minnesota Education: PhD Plant Science, Pogson Lab, Centre for Plant Energy Biology,…

Nischal Karki, first author of Metabolically distinct pools of phosphatidylcholine are involved in trafficking of fatty acids out of and into the chloroplast for membrane production Current Position: Graduate Student, Chemistry, Southern Methodist University Education: B.S. in Biochemistry, University…