In the grass family (Poaceae), the subfamily Pooideae, which includes economically important species like wheat, barley and forage grasses like ryegrass, dominates cold temperate habitats, although the ancestors of this group probably were adapted to tropical climates. Schubert et al. investigated the…

Microbial pathogens secrete virulence effector proteins into host cells to suppress basal plant defenses. Plant resistance (R) receptors induce robust immune signaling after directly or indirectly detect such effector-mediated host manipulation. In Arabidopsis, immunity transduced through many TNL (TIR-NBS-LRR)…

Land plants evolved from freshwater streptophytic algae over 450 million years ago and have since separated into morphologically diverse lineages. A key feature in the transition from aquatic to terrestrial life was the development of 3D body plans with lateral organs. In a new preprint, Naramoto and…

Male sterility in seed production could be used to increase crop yields, eliminate pollen allergies or avoid gene flow between genetically modified plants and other species. Here, Roque et al. developed a system to produce engineered nuclear male sterile plants using the pea Pisum sativum ENDOTHECIUM…

Photosynthetic microbes are emerging models for synthetic biology applications since they possess relatively simple physiology and cellular organization, fast growth in liquid culture, and facile genetic manipulation. In this paper, Vavitsas et al. review current synthetic biology tools and applications…

Harriet Parsons, co-first author and corresponding author of Separating Golgi Proteins from Cis to Trans Reveals Underlying Properties of Cisternal Localization Current position: Maternity leave until 2020 Education: PhD in Plant Biochemistry, University of Edinburgh Non-specific interests: Hiking,…

Techniques to isolate the RNA molecules bound to a specific protein, via co-immunoprecipitation, for instance, have been available for years. The converse—methods to identify the proteins bound to a specific RNA—have been harder to come by, in part because of difficulty in elucidating the determinants…

Jason Sims, first author of Meiotic DNA repair in the nucleolus employs a non-homologous end joining mechanism Current Position: Post-doctoral researcher at the University of Vienna / MFPL Education: PhD in molecular biology, special doctoral program in Chromosome Dynamics, from the University of…