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Messenger RNAs are translocated between plant shoots and roots in patterns that reflect directionality, environmental responsiveness, and organ targeting.
The diversity of agricultural systems has been minimized in order to maximize yields under favourable conditions. Diversification of agroecosystems may be required to maintain and stabilize yields in an increasingly unpredictable climate.
A new large-scale sequencing and phenotyping experiment of hybrid rice varieties leads to associations with genetic determinants whose mode of action was revealed.
The auxin receptor TIR1 is an F-box protein functioning in a ubiquitin ligase complex to target repressors for degradation. It is itself an unstable protein, but newly identified mutations protect both TIR1 and its substrates from degradation. These mutations could help in identifying the substrates for hundreds of other F-box proteins.
The nitrate transporter NRT1.1 is a versatile plasma-membrane protein that mediates not only nitrate uptake in roots, but also nitrate sensing and signalling. A study of the structural features of NRT1.1 reveals how this protein can coordinate a range of physiological and morphological responses to nitrate.
Animal microRNAs appear to either cleave or repress the translation of target messenger RNAs depending on complementarity between the two. Contrastingly, the biogenesis of plant microRNAs seems to dictate their mode of action.
Transposons are a major component of many plant genomes. A comparison of two related species differing in genome size and transposon content provides an opportunity to study how transposons contribute to shaping the genome and epigenome.
Asymmetric cell divisions establish the patterning of stomata in maize. PAN receptor-like kinases were thought to start a signalling cascade leading to pre-mitotic polarization of the cell. Re-analysis of mutants now reveals that the SCAR/WAVE complex is involved in the early initiation of polarity in mother cells.
The development of a new jasmonate reporter further extends the tools that add greater detail to the investigation of plant hormones. Such reporters for the various types of plant hormones, exploiting different aspects of their activity, will help us to eventually study hormone signalling, distribution and dynamics in intact tissue.
A 180-year-old ‘law’ in zoology has found its best support so far in a study of floral colour, which not only documents darker plants growing closer to the equator, but also supports the idea that the colour stems from ultraviolet protection.
Sequencing ancient DNA from archaeological samples reveals both how maize was transported through North America, and the shifting genomic patterns in response to selection for drought tolerance and sugar content.
Rubisco catalyses the first step in photosynthetic carbon fixation, but it can be easily poisoned by side-products of its activity. Structural and functional analyses of a protein conserved across plants, algae and bacteria shows how one such blockage is both removed and recycled.
Ascorbate is synthesized in mitochondria but needed in chloroplasts. Identification of a transporter bridging the chloroplast envelope membranes that separate cell cytoplasm from chloroplast stroma reveals a connection between ascorbate transport and cellular redox homeostasis.
