Volume 4 Issue 8, August 2018

A Review summarizes up-to-date understandings of the duration and demographic history of crop domestication and its effects on extant genomic variations, including structural variations about which we currently lack sufficient knowledge.

This Review summarizes our understanding of plant chromatin organization and positioning beyond the nucleosomal level, advanced by up-to-date chromatin conformation capture methods and visualization techniques, as well as discusses future directions.

A MATL gene mutation was found to induce haploids in maize. Now, knocking out the MATL orthologue in rice results in haploid induction at a rate of 2–6%, suggesting the functional conservation of MATL, and represents an advance for rice breeding.

Plants are sensitive to temperature changes. Now, researchers have found an alternative splicing factor that is essential for the development of Arabidopsis under low temperature, and bridges between alternative splicing and temperature sensitivity.

Fossil records suggest that the Amazon rainforest in the pre-Columbian era was home to polyculture agroforestry, with multiple annual crops providing subsistence for indigenous groups who shaped the Amazon as early as 4,500 years ago.

In Arabidopsis, the pattern of auxin in the early embryo and surrounding tissues before and after pollination suggests that the auxin needed for embryo development comes from the adjacent maternal integument tissue.

This study provides a map of N⁶-methyladenine in the rice genome, examines its association with gene expression and 5-methylcytosine and reports a potential demethylase for this epigenomic mark.

Chloroplast translation is critical for chloroplast biogenesis. The degree of conservation and divergence of chloroplast translation among different plant species is still enigmatic. Now, a targeted ribosome-profiling approach was applied in three model plants to tackle this problem.

NLR immune receptors recognize pathogen effectors and activate a response that leads to resistance. The specific interactions between five rice receptor variants and their cognate effectors are studied by solving the structures of the complexes.

How can cells differentiate into different types? Here, the authors identify the minimal requirement (the SHR transcription factor and the CIF2 peptide) in Arabidopsis roots to transform an epidermis cell into an endodermis cell.

Two opposite processes control the size of the protective root cap in Arabidopsis during growth: cell division and shedding of old cells layers (sloughing). Here, the authors show the role of a receptor–ligand pair in this regulation.

The vascular cambium is a lateral meristem that is particularly active during secondary growth. Here, several signalling pathways (peptide, receptor, auxin and cytokinin) are linked together to explain how vascular development is regulated.