Gentiana leucomelaena manifests dramatic flower color polymorphism, with both blue- and white-flowered individuals (pollinated by flies and bees) both within a population and on an individual plant. Previous studies of this species have shown that pollinator preference and flower temperature change as a function of flower color throughout the flowering season. However, few if any studies have e...

Most wild and semi-wild species of the genus Gossypium are exhibit photoperiod-sensitive flowering. The wild germplasm cotton is a valuable source of genes for genetic improvement of modern cotton cultivars. A bi-parental cotton population segregating for photoperiodic flowering was developed by crossing a photoperiod insensitive irradiation mutant line with its pre-mutagenesis photoperiodic wi...

Flowering is an important trait in major crops like soybean due to its direct relation to grain production. The circadian clock mediates the perception of seasonal changes in day length and temperature to modulate flowering time. The circadian clock gene EARLY FLOWERING 4 (ELF4) was identified in Arabidopsis thaliana and is believed to play a key role in the integration of photoperiod, circadia...

The circadian clock is an endogenous oscillator with a period of approximately 24 h that allows organisms to anticipate, and respond to, changes in the environment. In Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana), the circadian clock regulates a wide variety of physiological processes, including hypocotyl elongation and flowering time. CIRCADIAN CLOCK ASSOCIATED1 (CCA1) is a central clock component, and ...

Arabidopsis thaliana early flowering 3 (ELF3) as a zeitnehmer (time taker) is responsible for generation of circadian rhythm and regulation of photoperiodic flowering. There are two orthologs (OsELF3-1 and OsELF3-2) of ELF3 in rice (Oryza sativa), but their roles have not yet been fully identified. Here, we performed a functional characterization of OsELF3-1 and revealed it plays a more predomi...

Ubiquitination is one of many known histone modifications that regulate gene expression. Here, we examine the Arabidopsis thaliana homologs of the yeast E2 and E3 enzymes responsible for H2B monoubiquitination (H2Bub1). Arabidopsis has two E3 homologs (HISTONE MONOUBIQUITINATION1 [HUB1] and HUB2) and three E2 homologs (UBIQUITIN CARRIER PROTEIN [UBC1] to UBC3). hub1 and hub2 mutants show the lo...

We have analyzed the flowering behavior of two Arabidopsis ecotypes: the laboratory strain Landsberg erecta (Ler) and an ecotype from the tropical Cape Verde Islands (Cvi). They differ little in their flowering phenotypes and in their responses to photoperiod length changes and to vernalization treatment. However, segregating populations derived from crosses between them showed a much larger va...

Actin-related proteins (ARPs) are found in the nuclei of all eukaryotic cells, but their functions are generally understood only in the context of their presence in various yeast and animal chromatin-modifying complexes. Arabidopsis thaliana ARP6 is a clear homolog of other eukaryotic ARP6s, including Saccharomyces cerevisiae ARP6, which was identified as a component of the SWR1 chromatin remod...