Volume 5 Issue 9, September 2019

Phosphatidic acid (PA) is a simple phospholipid of crucial importance in cell biology. Now, a new ratiometric, PA-specific, optogenetic biosensor has been developed to track PA concentration and dynamics at the plant plasma membrane. Using this tool, scientists have revealed a remarkable stress-specific temporal complexity of PA accumulation.

Grape genomes show extensive structural variation. This apparent consequence of decades and centuries of clonal propagation underlies several domestication traits.

A Review presents current understanding of the developmental mechanisms underlying flower diversification by summarizing up-to-date knowledge on the initiation, identity determination, morphogenesis and maturation of floral organs.

This short Review summarizes recent findings on plasma membrane and cell wall integrity signalling, particularly during development and stress responses. It also introduces several technological advances to analyse mechanical properties of cell walls.

This study identifies the CLE peptides involved with the SUNN receptor in the autoregulation of the mycorrhizal symbiosis pathway during colonization of Medicago roots by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi.

In Brassicaceae, half of the flowers are formed on secondary inflorescences, independently of the absolute number of flowers. This rule is valid in several species and various Arabidopsis mutants.

Tropical carbon stocks are essential for proper accounting of global carbon budgets, but difficult to monitor on a large scale. L-band microwave observations used here enable direct and spatially explicit accounting of annual carbon fluxes from different types of land surface.

Climate change is projected to warm higher latitudes at an increasing rate, probably causing more forest fires and altering native boreal forest composition. Alaskan conifer trees could decline in importance relative to deciduous broadleaf trees, modifying feedback loops within the entire forest ecosystem and with the climate.

The remarkable diversity of plant leaf shapes raises a question: what is the biological relevance of the different shapes? Now researchers have discovered the preference of a leaf-processing herbivore for non-lobed leaves, indicating that leaf shape is an adaptive trait.

This study identified structural variants in grapevine populations, including wild progenitors, using a de novo assembly and comparative genomics approach, and examined their evolutionary genomics and roles in domestication and phenotypic evolution.

Using a set of eleven maize lines that were selfed for six generations, a study examined the dynamics of heterozygosity and genome size resulting from selfing and the purging patterns of deleterious single nucleotide polymorphisms and transposable elements.

A study identified unprecedented horizontal gene transfer (HGT) events in Cuscuta campestris and related species, and provides insights into convergent HGTs between Cuscuta and Orobanchaceae parasites and the functional importance of the HGT sequences.

Stomata act to control CO₂ uptake and water loss, integrating endogenous signals with environmental cues to ‘set’ stomatal aperture. Separate closure-inducing signals access unique but partially overlapping, modular gene networks.

Phosphatidic acid constitutes less than 1% of total lipids, but does not play a minor role. It serves as a lipid precursor, affects membrane curvature and regulates signalling transduction. Now, by employing a new powerful PAleon biosensor, the researchers visualized PA dynamics in different pH conditions corresponding to salt stress responses in Arabidopsis.