Tag: Evo-devo

Asteraceae, also known as Compositae or the daisy family, is one of the largest plant families and comprises 10% of all flowering plants. Members of this family are found in habitats worldwide. The unique inflorescence, called a capitulum, is a key innovation of the family and contributes to its success.…

Marchantia’s power as a model organism continues to grow! Here, Ramoni et al. have investigated the expression pattern of the proximal promoters of most of its 450 transcription factor (TF)-encoding genes. The promoter elements were fused to nuclear-localized fluorescent reporters and introduced into…

The definition of a phytohormone has not always been clear, though most plant biologists agree that phytohormones can be defined as endogenous molecules capable of triggering signaling cascades and associated responses by binding to specific receptors. They have been extensively studied in flowering…

Plants use a suite of cell-surface receptors as signal transducers in both development and immunity. In this study, Ngou et al. utilized computational and functional approaches to examine the evolutionary origin of a subclass of plant cell-surface receptors called pattern recognition receptors (PRRs),…

RETINOBLASTOMA-RELATED (RBR) is the plant homolog of the metazoan Retinoblastoma protein (pRB) tumor suppressor and is a conserved cell cycle regulator. RBR has been linked to several multicellularity-related processes, such as controlled cell proliferation, stem cell regulation, and asymmetric cell…

“Grassy biomes—from the steppes of Mongolia to the savannas of Tanzania— are predicted to be the ecosystems hardest hit by the ongoing climate and land use crises,” begins a Perspective by Strömberg and Staver in the August 4, 2022 Science special issue on Grasses that raises awareness of the…

The development of vascular plants (tracheophytes) was a major innovation during the evolution of land plants. The classic view is that the evolution of transporting tissues is distinct to tracheophytes, but Woudenberg and Renema et al. discuss an alternative hypothesis where this was a gradual process…

The shoot apical meristem (SAM) maintains a small pool of pluripotent stem cells, which are the source of all above-ground plant tissues. In Arabidopsis thaliana, CLAVATA3 (CLV3), CLAVATA1(CLV1) and RECEPTOR-LIKE PROTEIN KINASE2 (RPK2) repress WUSCHEL (WUS) expression. WUS induces CLV3, forming a local…