Tag: Genetics

Taylor Beaulieu (she/her) is currently a third year graduate student at UC-Riverside (UCR). She received her BS in Plant Biology from UCR and also received a minor in Education. She originally spent her undergraduate education training to become a K-12 science teacher which gave her training experience…

Generally, evolution is driven by natural selection, but not always. Human activities lead to the creation of unique niches, and other organisms must adapt accordingly. Cities are unique niches that are significantly different from rural areas and natural conditions. The urban habitat provides plants…

Morphogenesis is a critical process in plants and animals that allows a cell, tissue, or organism to reach its final shape. In Arabidopsis thaliana, the formation of lateral root primordia (LRP) is an excellent example of organ morphogenesis that involves cell remodeling throughout differential growth…

Global warming severely affects agricultural harvests, risking food security. To deal with heat stress, plants show different strategies. Indeed, heat increases intracellular Ca2+ levels to activate a heat shock response. In addition, GTP-binding proteins, which transduce extracellular signals to intracellular…

Mutations, defined as changes in DNA sequence, have long been considered to be random. However, growing evidence suggests that maybe mutations are not random, but instead some loci in the genome are hot spots for mutations, while other loci rarely mutate. This effect is considered mutation bias. A recent…

A new paper looking at transposable elements in maize uses the framework that genomes are similar to ecosystems, in that it is essential to study them comprehensively, from the level of each element to the global structure. Transposable elements (TEs) are dynamic and persistent within plant genomes.…

Albino plants lack chlorophyll, which means that they cannot photosynthesize. These kinds of plant are unique and can offer information as to the molecular mechanism of chlorophyll degradation and photosynthesis in plants. Here, Arisha et al. explored the differences in gene expression patterns of seedling…

In plants with sexual reproduction, the male contribution (two sperm cells) is necessary to fertilize two female cells, the egg cell that gives rise to the embryo and the central cell that gives rise to the endosperm. In contrast, apomictic plants (0.1% of flowering plants spread over 120 genera) don´t…