Physcomitrella patens

Arabidopsis and other species, this work has also begun to reveal the levels of evolutionary conservation within the flowering plants and even outside the plant kingdom. What does the future hold for Antirrhinum research? In addition to its continuing role as a genetic model for plant biology and development, several new experimental avenues are beginning to be explored with Antirrhinum. A major challenge in biology is to link variation at the molecular level to phenotypes and to the evolutionary and ecological significance of a trait. Comparisons of closely related taxa can be especially informative about microevolutionary processes, and Antirrhinum is an excellent model for this kind of analysis. About 18 wild Antirrhinum species are found in SouthWest Europe and Northern Africa: these display considerable variation in these traits, including flower colour patterns, flower and leaf shape and size and plant growth habit. Usefully, most of the species are interfertile, and so amenable to genetic analysis. This makes it feasible to identify and isolate genes that underlie species differences and to test the adaptive importance of traits. Antirrhinum is also embracing the technology age: a virtual snapdragon project is currently underway. It is hoped that modelling the growth and development of Antirrhinum will provide insight into the patterns and processes underlying plant development. Here's to the next 150 years of Antirrhinum research! Where can I find out more? What is Physcomitrella patens? A moss which is proving to be a useful new model plant species, one that is increasingly being used in experimental studies. What place have mosses in the wider scheme of things? They are plants, though rather different from the seed plants which usually come to mind when we think of plants — the flowering plants, such as the weed Arabidopsis, or conifers, such as the Christmas tree. Mosses do not have flowers, vascular tissue or seeds; they are thus grouped into a different subdivision of plants — of which there are four in total — from the flowering plants. Mosses and liverworts used to be placed in the same phylum, but they are now generally regarded as being sufficiently different to be placed in two distinct phyla: Bryophyta and Hepatophyta, respectively. Mosses have evolved with little change from the first land plants. and include about 24,000 different living species. A tiny plant, upside-down... All plants develop from single cells. In seed plants, these zygotes develop into embryos which …