Review Articles

This review explores recent advances in research on the regulatory and evolutionary mechanisms of plant specialized metabolism and extrapolates these findings to medicinal plants that synthesize rare molecules.

This Review summarizes our current knowledge from genomics and fossil records about the evolutionary transition from charophycean algae to embryophytes, with a focus on the progressive assembly of the embryophyte genetic innovations during terrestrialization.

This Review summarizes current technologies for organellar genome editing in plants and their applications, and highlights opportunities brought by emerging techniques such as RNA editing, prime editing and new transformation methods.

Homogalacturonans are the most abundant pectin subtype in plant cell walls and also function as signalling molecules. Homogalacturonans thus connect the cell wall and plasma membrane to regulate plant growth and development.

The establishment of cell polarity is essential for plant growth and development. The process involves biochemical cues and mechanical changes. Here the authors review the establishment of polarity in plant cells, with a particular focus on the molecular players connecting mechanical information and cell morphogenesis.

Biological membrane bilayers typically have distinct phospholipid compositions in the two leaflets, which require lipid translocation mediated by transporters called lipid flippases. These proteins are crucial for cell survival and various physiological activities in eukaryotic cells. This Review discusses the current knowledge of lipid flippases in plants.

This Review summarizes the current status of base editors and prime editors in plants, reporting both technological developments and biological applications of these precise genome editors.

This Review summarizes current strategies for manipulating genetic linkages in plants, with a focus on the use of CRISPR–Cas technology to generate heritable and targeted chromosomal rearrangements for crop improvement and synthetic biology.

This Review covers the recent advancements in our understanding of reactive oxygen species production, regulation and perception in plants. It is primarily focused on stress responses and the role of NADPH oxidases.

This Review summarizes the available and missing reference genomes in the seed-free plant lineages, compares the genomic and epigenomic features between seed-free and seed plants, and highlights the model systems of seed-free plants.

This work reviews our understanding of plant sex-determining systems and the molecular mechanisms underlying the evolutionary shifts to dioecy. The homomorphy of plant sex chromosomes and their small sex-determining regions are attributed to limited sexual conflict.

Light-dependent protochlorophyllide oxidoreductase (LPOR) is a light-activated enzyme that catalyses a vital step in chlorophyll biosynthesis and acts as a key regulator of plant greening. In this Review, the authors summarize recent progress in the functional, chemical and structural understanding of LPOR photocatalysis in plants.

Managing agricultural microbiomes is an efficient approach to improve crop performance in agroecosystems. This Review summarizes the current state of knowledge from less to more targeted approaches to manage soil, plant and pest-associated microbiomes. The authors also identify the knowledge gaps in relation to current agricultural practices in microbiome management.

Cullin3–RING ligases (CRL3s) are a subclass of the vast family of ubiquitin E3 ligases. This Review comprehensively explores the role of CLR3 proteins in various biological processes, in light of exciting recent discoveries.

A comprehensive overview of how oil palm expansion and production has impacted forests on an international scale.

This Review summarizes the growth of plant pan-genome studies, explore the origins of gene presence and absence variation, and introduces the impacts of pan-genomes on plant biology, breeding and evolutionary studies.

This Review presents recent advances in our understanding of calcium signalling mechanisms, and how calcium channels work together to encode stimulus-specific calcium patterns, to finally elicit changes in cellular responses.

Many adaptive responses to changing environmental and developmental conditions can limit crop plant growth. Crop yield increases could result from coupling current metabolic concepts and the molecular processes determining sink development.

This short Review summarizes recent findings on plasma membrane and cell wall integrity signalling, particularly during development and stress responses. It also introduces several technological advances to analyse mechanical properties of cell walls.

A Review presents current understanding of the developmental mechanisms underlying flower diversification by summarizing up-to-date knowledge on the initiation, identity determination, morphogenesis and maturation of floral organs.