Analysis of pea mutants reveals the conserved role of FRUITFULL controlling the end of flowering and its potential to boost yield

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Martinez-Fernandez, Irene; Fourquin, Chloe; Lindsay, Donna; Berbel, Ana; Balanza, Vicente; Huang, Shaoming; Dalmais, Marion; Lesignor, Christine; Bendahmane, Abdelhafid; Warkentin, Thomas D.; Madueno, Francisco; Ferrandiz, Cristina; Coupland, George
• 署名单位: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC); Universitat Politecnica de Valencia; CSIC-UPV - Instituto de Biologia Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP); University of Saskatchewan; Universite Paris Saclay; Universite Paris Cite; Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS); Universite Paris Saclay; INRAE; Universite Paris Cite; Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS); INRAE; Universite Bourgogne Europe; Institut Agro; AgroSup Dijon
• 刊物名称: PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0027-13717
• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2321975121
• 发表日期: 2024-04-09
• 关键词: apical senescence; pisum-sativum; inflorescence architecture; plant architecture; meristem identity; genes; arabidopsis; GROWTH; time; diversification

摘要

Monocarpic plants have a single reproductive phase in their life. Therefore, flower and fruit production are restricted to the length of this period. This reproductive strategy involves the regulation of flowering cessation by a coordinated arrest of the growth of the inflorescence meristems, optimizing resource allocation to ensure seed filling. Flowering cessation appears to be a regulated phenomenon in all monocarpic plants. Early studies in several species identified seed production as a major factor triggering inflorescence proliferative arrest. Recently, genetic factors controlling inflorescence arrest, in parallel to the putative signals elicited by seed production, have started to be uncovered in Arabidopsis, with the MADS-box gene FRUITFULL (FUL) playing a central role in the process. However, whether the genetic network regulating arrest is also at play in other species is completely unknown. Here, we show that this role of FUL is not restricted to Arabidopsis but is conserved in another monocarpic species with a different inflorescence structure, field pea, strongly suggesting that the network controlling the end of flowering is common to other plants. Moreover, field trials with lines carrying mutations in pea FUL genes show that they could be used to boost crop yield.