Plant genetics articles within Nature Reviews Genetics

Featured

  • Review Article |

    Plants have uniquely adapted to manage endoplasmic reticulum stress triggered by protein misfolding. The authors review the dynamics of gene expression regulation underlying the unfolded protein response in plants, highlighting recent insights provided by systems-level approaches and omics data.

    • Dae Kwan Ko
    •  & Federica Brandizzi

  • Review Article |

    Plant pangenomes have had a transformative impact on crop enhancement, biodiversity conservation and evolutionary research. This Review delves into the application of plant pangenomes for understanding trait diversity, aiding breeding, biodiversity classification and monitoring, and illuminating evolutionary innovations.

    • Mona Schreiber
    • , Murukarthick Jayakodi
    •  & Martin Mascher

  • Comment |

    In April 2023, leading experts met with members of US Congress to discuss strategies to ensure global food security. Following on from this, Pamela Ronald emphasizes the role that plant genetics has in achieving these goals.

    • Pamela C. Ronald

  • Journal Club |

    Fay-Wei Li recalls a 1966 paper by Klekowski and Baker, who built on their observation that homosporous pteridophytes have many more chromosomes than heterosporous lineages to generate hypotheses on the evolutionary impact of polyploidy.

    • Fay-Wei Li

  • In Brief |

    A paper in Nature Communications describes a framework for identifying seed traits in food crops that have health-promoting effects on the gut microbiome, with implications for crop improvement approaches.

    • Dorothy Clyde

  • Perspective |

    Commemorating the 200th birthday of Gregor Mendel, Kim Nasmyth reflects on Mendel’s life and legacy and how his work has shaped and defined the field of modern genetics.

    • Kim Nasmyth

  • In Brief |

    Omary et al. map shoot-borne root development at single-cell resolution in tomato to identify the origin of shoot-borne roots.

    • Linda Koch

  • Research Highlight |

    A recent paper in Nature describes how CRISPR-based engineering of wheat confers robust resistance to powdery mildew disease without negatively impacting crop growth and yields.

    • Xian Deng
    •  & Xiaofeng Cao

  • Journal Club |

    Michael Purugganan reflects on a 100-year-old publication by Nikolai Vavilov, which postulated a new law of genetics from which key evolutionary insights emerged and which guided future molecular genetic investigations.

    • Michael D. Purugganan

  • In Brief |

    A paper in Cell reports a chromosome-level genome assembly and methylome for the conifer Pinus tabuliformis. At 25.4 Gb, it the largest gymnosperm genome available to date and provides insight into conifer adaptation.

    • Dorothy Clyde

  • Review Article |

    In this Review, Zhang et al. summarize our current understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying the responses of plants to abiotic stresses, and how this knowledge can be used to improve crop resilience through genetic, chemical and microbial approaches.

    • Huiming Zhang
    • , Jianhua Zhu
    •  & Jian-Kang Zhu

  • Review Article |

    The authors review intra-individual and inter-individual plant epigenome variation during development and in response to environmental changes, including stress. They also discuss functions of epigenome plasticity and epigenome editing technologies that will drive future research.

    • James P. B. Lloyd
    •  & Ryan Lister

  • Review Article |

    Omics methods can be used to mine the genomes of diverse organisms, from microorganisms to plants and animals, for the discovery of natural products and their biosynthetic genes. In this Review, the authors review the why, what, where and how of genome mining.

    • Marnix H. Medema
    • , Tristan de Rond
    •  & Bradley S. Moore

  • Research Highlight |

    Xia et al. highlight an unexpected horizontal gene transfer event, whereby the sweet potato whitefly has harnessed a host plant detoxification mechanism to resist its defences.

    • Ingrid Knarston

  • Journal Club |

    Qifa Zhang describes how a 2008 publication in Nature Biotechnology on transgenic purple tomatoes inspired him to tackle food security by improving the nutrient and culinary value of black rice.

    • Qifa Zhang

  • Research Highlight |

    Two papers in Nature Plants provide evidence that plants, like mammals, regulate gene expression from long-range cis-regulatory elements (CREs). Plant CREs are widespread and have distinct evolutionarily conserved chromatin characteristics that are predictive of their effect on gene expression.

    • Dorothy Clyde

  • Research Highlight |

    Two studies in Nature Genetics provide high-resolution maps of genetic variation across melon and watermelon species, respectively, and identify candidate loci linked to fruit quality traits through genome-wide association studies and population genomic analyses.

    • Linda Koch

  • Review Article |

    Genomic technologies are helping researchers to understand the natural genetic variation that exists in wild and cultivated rice populations. Harnessing this genetic variation will be key to developing Green Super Rice varieties with high yield and low environmental costs.

    • Rod A. Wing
    • , Michael D. Purugganan
    •  & Qifa Zhang

  • Review Article |

    Fruit flavour is a complex phenotype that has been adversely affected by human intervention. Recent progress in defining the chemistry of consumer preferences and the availability of high-quality genome sequences are providing a foundation for defining the genetics underlying this trait and could be used for flavour improvement.

    • Harry J. Klee
    •  & Denise M. Tieman

  • Review Article |

    Disease-resistant crops have the potential to reduce crop losses. This Review discusses how advances in genetic and genomic technologies are contributing to efforts by plant breeders to generate durable, broad-spectrum disease resistance in crop plants.

    • Rebecca Nelson
    • , Tyr Wiesner-Hanks
    •  & Peter Balint-Kurti

  • Review Article |

    To unlock the potential of epigenetic variation for crop improvement, it will be crucial to understand how epigenetic variation is established and how it is stably inherited across generations. Springer and Schmitz review these challenges, the different sources of epigenetic variation in plants, and how epigenome profiling and engineering could help to improve crops.

    • Nathan M. Springer
    •  & Robert J. Schmitz

  • Review Article |

    In this Review, the author discusses current knowledge on the paramutations that occur in maize and contrasts these behaviours with potentially parallel examples in metazoans. He highlights the key role of small RNAs (sRNAs) in diverse paramutation mechanisms across eukaryotes and considers the evolutionary importance of these regulatory systems.

    • Jay B. Hollick

  • Review Article |

    The authors review recent studies into the heritable basis of population epigenomic variation and discuss important challenges when interpreting results from these genetic studies in different species to highlight the state of knowledge regarding how genetic variation can influence differences in chromatin states between individuals.

    • Aaron Taudt
    • , Maria Colomé-Tatché
    •  & Frank Johannes

  • Review Article |

    Arabidopsis thaliana, a member of the phenotypically diverse Brassicaceae family, has proved to be a key model organism for characterizing plant genome and morphological evolution. This Review outlines how recent comparative and functional genomic studies usingArabidopsisrelatives have further advanced our understanding of plant diversity and evolution.

    • Daniel Koenig
    •  & Detlef Weigel

  • Review Article |

    The rising human population and climate instability are putting unprecedented pressure on global agricultural practices. This Review describes the diverse mechanisms by which plants tolerate various stresses, such as flooding, drought, toxins, salinity and temperature extremes. The authors focus on how the genetic loci that underlie these survival and tolerance traits can be introgressed into current crops to improve yield stability.

    • Michael V. Mickelbart
    • , Paul M. Hasegawa
    •  & Julia Bailey-Serres

  • Review Article |

    DNA and histone modifications undergo extensive reprogramming to reset the epigenomic state between generations. This Review discusses the mechanisms and consequences of epigenetic reprogramming during plant sexual reproduction. Despite various similarities to the equivalent process in mammals, a key difference is the seemingly incomplete reprogramming of plant epigenomes, which has implications for evolution and transgenerational epigenetic inheritance.

    • Tomokazu Kawashima
    •  & Frédéric Berger

  • Review Article |

    The recent improvement in technologies to identify genetic variants linked with quantitative traits has allowed the identification of variants that are associated with crop domestication. This Review considers these approaches and their application to the study of crop domestication.

    • Rachel S. Meyer
    •  & Michael D. Purugganan

  • Review Article |

    New tools for plant biotechnology are emerging, including synthetic promoters, 'tunable' transcription factors, genome-editing tools and site-specific recombinases. These tools promise to expand the range of plant biotechnology applications, especially when integrated with approaches for manipulating large DNA constructs.

    • Wusheng Liu
    • , Joshua S. Yuan
    •  & C. Neal Stewart Jr

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