Timing of flowering is determined by environmental and developmental signals, leading to promotion or repression of key floral integrators. SENSITIVITY TO RED LIGHT REDUCED (SRR1) is a pioneer protein previously shown to be involved in regulation of the circadian clock and phytochrome B signalling in Arabidopsis thaliana. This report has examined the role of SRR1 in flowering time control. Loss...

As our understanding of developmental mechanisms in flowering plant species has become more advanced, an appreciation of the need to understand how distinct plant morphologies are generated has grown. This has led to an awareness of the key morphological differences in distinct land plant groups and to an assessment of the major innovations that occurred during land plant evolution. Recent adva...

Since the discovery of double fertilization, it has been recognized that flowering plants produce two highly dimorphic female gametes, the egg cell and central cell. These give rise, respectively, to the embryo and the endosperm, a nourishing tissue unique to flowering plants. Here we show that in Arabidopsis, endosperm formation requires the CYTOKININ INDEPENDENT 1 (CKI1) histidine kinase, an ...

Flowering in plants is a consequence of the transition of the shoot apex from vegetative to reproductive growth in response to environmental and internal signals. The indeterminate1 gene (id1) controls the transition to flowering in maize. We show by cloning the id1 gene that it encodes a protein with zinc finger motifs, suggesting that the id1 gene product functions as a transcriptional regula...

A new model to analyse reciprocal transfer experiments to assess stages of photoperiod sensitivity in Antirrhinum has been validated in the present study. Flowering time and leaf numbers data of Antirrhinum cultivars Chimes White, Liberty White, Ariane, Winter Euro Rose, Sonnet and Rocket Orchid were used for the validation of the model. Six plants of each cultivar were transferred from LD to S...

Recently, two areas of plant phylogeny have developed in ways that could not have been anticipated, even a few years ago. Among extant seed plants, new phylogenetic hypotheses suggest that Gnetales, a group of nonflowering seed plants widely hypothesized to be the closest extant relatives of angiosperms, may be less closely related to angiosperms than was believed. In addition, recent phylogene...

microRNA156 (miR156) affects developmental timing in flowering plants. miR156 and its target relationships with members of the SQUAMOSA PROMOTER BINDING PROTEIN-LIKE (SPL) gene family appear universally conserved in land plants, but the specific functions of miR156 outside of flowering plants are unknown. We find that miR156 promotes a developmental change from young filamentous protonemata to ...

Cultivated strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa Duch.) is one of the most important berry crops worldwide. Its wild relative, woodland strawberry (Fragaria vesca L.) is also scientifically important, since recent development of molecular tools including genetic transformation methods, genetic maps and genome sequence is making it as one of the leading perennial model plants. Environmental regulation...

Plants have evolved many systems to sense their environment and to modify their growth and development accordingly. One example is vernalization, the process by which flowering is promoted as plants sense exposure to the cold temperatures of winter. A requirement for vernalization is an adaptive trait that helps prevent flowering before winter and permits flowering in the favorable conditions o...