Low temperature combined with low light (LL) is an adverse factor seriously affecting pepper productivity and quality. However, little known about the molecular mechanisms related to LL stress responses. Therefore, transcriptome physiological changes in Hangjiao No. 2 (H2) Xiangtela (X2) were studied under normal conditions LL. We found 8,392 8,028 differentially expressed genes H2 X2, respecti...

Chloroplasts have been reported to generate retrograde immune signals that activate defense gene expression in the nucleus. However, the roles of light and photosynthesis in plant immunity remain largely elusive. In this study, we evaluated the effects of light on the expression of defense genes induced by flg22, a peptide derived from bacterial flagellins which acts as a potent elicitor in pla...

Cassava is an important staple crop in tropical and sub-tropical areas. As a common farming practice, cassava is usually cultivated intercropping with other crops and subjected to various degrees of shading, which causes reduced productivity. Herein, a comparative transcriptomic analysis was performed on a series of developmental cassava leaves under both full sunlight and natural shade conditi...

Cyanobacteria are photosynthetic organisms and are the only prokaryotes known to have a circadian lifestyle. Unicellular diazotrophic cyanobacteria such as Cyanothece sp. ATCC 51142 produce oxygen and can also fix atmospheric nitrogen, a process exquisitely sensitive to oxygen. To accommodate such antagonistic processes, the intracellular environment of Cyanothece oscillates between aerobic and...

Ulva prolifera, a typical green-tide-forming alga, can accumulate a large biomass in a relatively short time period, suggesting that photosynthesis in this organism, particularly its carbon fixation pathway, must be very efficient. Green algae are known to generally perform C₃ photosynthesis, but recent metabolic labeling and genome sequencing data suggest that they may also perform C₄ photosyn...

Increasing the rate of leaf photosynthesis is one important approach for increasing grain yield in rice (Oryza sativa). Exploiting the natural variation in CO2 assimilation rate (A) between rice cultivars using quantitative genetics is one promising means to identify genes contributing to higher photosynthesis. In this study, we determined precise location of Carbon Assimilation Rate 8 (CAR8) b...

C4 photosynthesis represents a most remarkable case of convergent evolution of a complex trait, which includes the reprogramming of the expression patterns of thousands of genes. Anatomical, physiological, and phylogenetic and analyses as well as computational modeling indicate that the establishment of a photorespiratory carbon pump (termed C2 photosynthesis) is a prerequisite for the evolutio...

During C4 photosynthesis, CO2 is concentrated around the enzyme RuBisCO. The net effect is to reduce photorespiration while increasing water and nitrogen use efficiencies. Species that use C4 photosynthesis have evolved independently from their C3 ancestors on more than 60 occasions. Along with mimicry and the camera-like eye, the C4 pathway therefore represents a remarkable example of the repe...

Acclimation of photosynthesis to elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration was tested in lines of soybean (Glycine max) that differed by single genes that altered either the capacity to nodulate or growth habit (determinate or indeterminate growth). Both genetic changes provided, within a uniform genetic background, a test of the “source–sink” hypothesis that down-regulation of photosyn...

Chloroplasts are believed to be descendants of an ancestral endosymbiont related to cyanobacteria. Comparative genomics is expected to be useful in identifying the proteins that were transferred to chloroplasts from the endosymbiont. However, most of the present-day chloroplast proteins are encoded by the nuclear genome, and it was not until the nuclear genome of a land plant Arabidopsis thalia...