Volume 3 Issue 8, August 2017

For multicellular organisms, long-distance communication is essential for coordination of organ growth and development. In higher plants, a dual root-to-shoot cytokinin signalling system plays a key role in adapting the growth of distant shoot organs to fluctuating environments.

Understanding the impacts of government interventions intended to support rural development — such as strengthening land rights or boosting commercial agriculture — is crucial for designing better policies. Two recent studies highlight some of the complexities in measuring outcomes for people and forests.

The evolutionary relationships between extinct species are almost exclusively based on the shape and structure of their fossil specimens. Now, a spectroscopic technique that records a ‘chemical fingerprint’ of fossil plant cuticles is being used to re-interpret the histories of thousands of specimens languishing in museum collections.

A Review Article describes recent progress in plant genome editing by introducing newly developed editing tools and methods and their application. The associated challenges and future prospects are also discussed.

Plants have long been recognized for their therapeutic properties. Now, modern science is unravelling the mechanisms of action of ancient herbal medicines and finding new ways to exploit them.

Archaeological evidence reveals the impacts of ancient hunter-gatherers and settlers on tropical forests over the last 45,000 years. Archaeology can thus play an important role in promoting heritage and informing conservation and policy-making.

Orange carotenoid proteins are involved in photoprotection in cyanobacteria. In this Article, a new family of orange carotenoid proteins are identified and characterized, combining phylogenetic analysis, biochemistry, spectroscopy and structural studies.

Increasing the accuracy of crop productivity estimates is key to ensuring global food security. This Article develops temperature response functions that reduce error in grain yield by 19% to 50%.

Leaf cuticle thickness can infer leaf mass area (LMA) of fossil plants. Gymnosperms from East Greenland show forests of low LMA taxa being replaced by high LMA taxa across the Triassic–Jurassic boundary as a result of CO₂-induced global warming.

PILS are emerging auxin transporters that can modulate the intracellular auxin distribution in Arabidopsis. The authors now link these proteins to a developmental process, the apical hook opening in response to light, and to phytochrome signalling.

After trans-zeatin riboside, the active cytokinin trans-zeatin is identified as the second major xylem cytokinin translocated from root to shoot. Interestingly, these two forms of root-derived cytokinins play different roles in regulating shoot development.

PopP2 is an effector from the YopJ family, present in plant and animal bacterial pathogens. Here, its structure is determined in complex with inositol hexaphosphate (IP₆) and bound to its target, the WRKY domain of the RRS1-R plant immune receptor.