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Plants regulate their microbiota to cope with diverse stresses. A recent study shows that rice maintains homeostasis of its phyllosphere microbiome through a secondary metabolite biosynthetic gene, which offers potential for harnessing microbiome-shaping genes in disease-resistance breeding.
This study by Scacchi et al. shows that a mobile small-RNA-based Turing system dynamically organizes plant organ polarity. The afforded developmental flexibility accounts for diversity in organ shapes, from radialized or cup-shaped to the robust planar shape of a typical leaf.
The authors developed a platform for rapid identification of interacting plant immune receptors and pathogen avirulence proteins by library screening in protoplasts, then used it to identify new wheat stem rust Avr genes recognized by known wheat resistance genes.
Effectors secreted by plant pathogens subvert host immunity. Here the authors use a structural approach to design a small molecule that can disrupt the interaction between a fungal effector and its target in rice, and could be used as a novel fungicide.
This study reveals that the thylakoid ultrastructural and supramolecular rearrangements that occur during the dark-to-light transition in plants control the connectivity between the two photosystems that drive oxygenic photosynthesis.
The destructive consequences of catastrophic wildfires, which are capable of destroying homes and livelihoods, frequently hit the front pages of newspapers worldwide. But scientific attention is increasingly turning towards understanding changes in wildfire regimes.
Trait prioritization studies have informed crop breeding programmes for decades. This scoping review identifies broad crop coverage, systematic sex disaggregation and reduced regional bias as priorities for more inclusive, demand-driven initiatives.
Brassinosteroids are perceived by the plasma membrane receptor BRI1. This Review summarizes what is known about the multi-layered interaction network that fine-tunes the activity and dynamics of BRI1 at the cell surface.
Chromosomal patterning of meiotic crossovers is mediated by pro-crossover HEI10 E3 ligase dynamics. This study reveals that a network of HSP40–HSP70 chaperones facilitates HEI10 proteolysis, thereby limiting formation of closely spaced crossovers.
Glandular trichomes (GTs) are biofactories that produce and store specialized compounds beneficial to plants as well as to humans. Using cucumber, we have discovered a new cell wall structure, ‘neck strip’, allowing GTs to function as biofactories.
Beaksedges harbour multiple centromeres in each chromosome, yet crossover distribution is distally biased, like in monocentric species, but with no correlation with (epi)genomic features. This study suggests that synapsis dynamics starting from chromosomal ends is key to the recombination pattern.
Castellani, Zhang and colleagues found that centromeres and (epi)genetic features influence local crossover positions during meiotic recombination in a plant with diffused centromeres, whereas chromosome synapsis dynamics seems key to broad-scale crossover patterning.
We reveal that the transcription factor SPATULA (SPT) directly interacts with, and is modified by, the O-glycosyl transferases SECRET AGENT (SEC) and SPINDLY (SPY) in Arabidopsis thaliana. O-linked β-N-acetylglucosamine (O-GlcNAc) and O-fucose post-translational modifications (PTMs) promoted elongation of the gynoecium apex (style) and its radial symmetry by promoting SPT function.
Histone acetylation is a predominant active chromatin mark. A feedback mechanism by which histone acetyltransferase responds to varying levels of acetyl coenzyme A in plants under adverse conditions maintains histone acetylation homeostasis.
Preferential fertilization of the egg or central cell during double fertilization has long been controversial. The authors demonstrate preferential sperm–egg fusion in Arabidopsis and show that EGG CELL 1, which is secreted by the egg cell, plays a decisive role in this process.