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A conserved microRNA module exerts homeotic control over Petunia hybrida and Antirrhinum majus floral organ identity

Abstract

It is commonly thought that deep phylogenetic conservation of plant microRNAs (miRNAs) and their targets1,2 indicates conserved regulatory functions. We show that the blind (bl) mutant of Petunia hybrida3 and the fistulata (fis) mutant of Antirrhinum majus4,5, which have similar homeotic phenotypes, are recessive alleles of two homologous miRNA-encoding genes. The BL and FIS genes control the spatial restriction of homeotic class C genes6,7 to the inner floral whorls, but their ubiquitous early floral expression patterns are in contradiction with a potential role in patterning C gene expression. We provide genetic evidence for the unexpected function of the MIRFIS and MIRBL genes in the center of the flower and propose a dynamic mechanism underlying their regulatory role. Notably, Arabidopsis thaliana, a more distantly related species, also contains this miRNA module but does not seem to use it to confine early C gene expression to the center of the flower.

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Figure 1: Phenotypes of mutant and wild-type flowers.
Figure 2: The BL and FIS miRNAs and their targets.
Figure 3: miRBL, miRFIS and AmNF-YA expression during early flower development.
Figure 4: Enhanced PLE gene expression in the A. majus fis-1 mutant.
Figure 5: Rescue of organ identity defects of the fim mutant in the absence of miRFIS.
Figure 6: Regulatory mechanism governed by miRFIS and miRBL to maintain the C domain boundary by controlling early C gene expression.

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Acknowledgements

We thank J. Burgyan for information on in situ analyses with miRNA; J. Stuurman and J. Moore (University of Berne) for the bl-2 allele and B. Davies, P. Huijser, H. Saedler and P. Schulze-Lefert for discussions and comments. This work was supported in part by a grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft/SFB572 (Z.S.-S.).

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Authors

Contributions

All authors contributed to the experiments, which were conceptually designed mainly by M.V. and Z.S.-S. Z.S.-S. wrote the manuscript, with support from M.V., M.C. and T.G.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Zsuzsanna Schwarz-Sommer.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Fig. 1

Neighbor-joining tree of Antirrhinum, Petunia and Arabidopsis NF-YA family members. (PDF 957 kb)

Supplementary Fig. 2

Detection of the in situ expression patterns of Antirrhinum NF-YA genes by different methods. (PDF 117 kb)

Supplementary Fig. 3

RNA blot analysis of microRNA expression, and analysis of gene expression by qRT-PCR. (PDF 106 kb)

Supplementary Table 1

Position of cleavage sites in the MRE of Antirrhinum and Petunia NF-YA transcripts. (PDF 28 kb)

Supplementary Table 2

Oligonucleotide sequences. (PDF 60 kb)

Supplementary Methods (PDF 66 kb)

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Cartolano, M., Castillo, R., Efremova, N. et al. A conserved microRNA module exerts homeotic control over Petunia hybrida and Antirrhinum majus floral organ identity. Nat Genet 39, 901–905 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng2056

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