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Embryonic lethality of Arabidopsis abp1-1 is caused by deletion of the adjacent BSM gene

Abstract

Decades of research have suggested that AUXIN BINDING PROTEIN 1 (ABP1) is an essential membrane-associated auxin receptor, but recent findings directly contradict this view. Here we show that embryonic lethality observed in abp1-1, which has been a cornerstone of ABP1 studies, is caused by the deletion of the neighbouring BELAYA SMERT (BSM) gene, not by disruption of ABP1. On the basis of our results, we conclude that ABP1 is not essential for Arabidopsis development.

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Figure 1: Rescue abp1-1 by the 35S:At4g02990/BSM transgene.
Figure 2: Characterization of abp1-1 rescued by the 35S:At4g02990 transgene.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Yangbin Gao and Brian Crawford for comments on this manuscript. This work was supported by NIH Grants R01GM114660 (Y. Zhao) and R01GM43644 (M.E.), the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (M.E.) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (M.E.).

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Y. Zhao conceived the project, X.D., Y. Zhang, D.Z., J.C., X.G. and Y. Zhao performed the experiments and analysed the data. M.E. and Y. Zhao wrote the paper.

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Correspondence to Yunde Zhao.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Dai, X., Zhang, Y., Zhang, D. et al. Embryonic lethality of Arabidopsis abp1-1 is caused by deletion of the adjacent BSM gene. Nature Plants 1, 15183 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nplants.2015.183

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nplants.2015.183

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