Tag: Evolution

Although angiosperms are the dominant autotrophs in most parts of the world, their evolutionary origins remain somewhat mysterious. Herendeen et al. review the earliest evidence for angiosperms from the Early Cretaceous, and discuss fossil remains from earlier periods (Jurassic, Triassic) that have some…

Moss are non-vascular plants and do not produce the phenolic polymer lignin, but they do have some enzymes associated with the lignin pathway, raising the question of the evolutionary origins of lignin. In angiosperms, the cytochrome P450 enzyme encoded by CYP98 catalyzes the first irreversible step…

Rice is the world’s most important food crop and its domestication was a key event in human history. Centuries of propagation across large geographical areas have resulted in five domesticated subpopulations:  aus, indica, temperate japonica, tropical japonica, and aromatic rice. Choi et al. analyzed…

Which arose first during evolution- a metabolite molecule or a transporter that could move it across a membrane?  Jørgensen et al. studied transporters for glucosinolate defense molecules in Brassicales species.  Glucosinolates are derived from the broad class of cyanogenic glucosides, and glucosinolates…

Brassicaceae is one of the largest angiosperm families and provides many opportunities for studies of evolution. Of course, its most famous species, Arabidopsis thaliana is an important resource, but Brassicaceae also includes the very interesting Brassica crops (cabbage, turnip) that demonstrate the…

Most angiosperms are hermaphrodites and produce flowers that have both male (stamens / sperm) and female (carpels / egg) parts. Pannell reviews the developmental and genetic programs that lead to these “perfect” flowers, as well as those that underlie reproductive structure development in dioecious…

Wednesday, 15 March 2017 Source: University of Western Australia A 60-year-old mystery has been solved by biochemists at The University of Western Australia investigating the origin of a type of digestion-inhibiting proteins thought only to exist in two plant families that contain the important…

Clocks in green algae have been described as simple two-gene loops, while clocks in angiosperms have evolved to complex interlocked loops. This striking jump in complexity led Linde et al. to investigate the clocks in bryophytes and charophytes to shed light on this transition. First, through the sequence…