Pollen tube articles from across Nature Portfolio

Cargo transport from the ER to the Golgi is highly selective. Here the authors identify three secretory pathway localized proteins that regulate ER sorting of receptor kinases in Arabidopsis and are required to support pollen tube growth.

Synergid cells undergo programmed cell death following pollen tube reception and successful fertilization. Here the authors show that premature synergid cell death is prevented by the mitogen activated protein kinase MPK4 and the R protein SUMM2 which maintain ROS homeostasis in Arabidopsis.

Arabidopsis pollen contains a vegetative nucleus and two sperm cells that move to the apical region during pollen tube growth. Here, Motomura et al. make use of transgenic pollen with immobilized nuclei and show that, contrary to previous assumptions, movement of the vegetative nucleus is not needed for pollen tube guidance.

Fertilized Arabidopsis egg cells secrete endopeptidases into the extracellular space that cleave the pollen tube attractor LURE1, preventing polytubey.

In plants, the absence of the retinal cofactor hinders the implementation of light-gated ion channels and optogenetic control of membrane potentials through rhodopsins. The engineering of β-carotene conversion into retinal now makes this powerful approach possible.

A major question in plant reproduction is how pollen tubes perceive and decode female cues from the ovule for directional delivery of sperm cells. MILDEW RESISTANCE LOCUS-O proteins regulate pollen tube guidance by decoding ovular signals.