Flavonol aglycones are required for pollen germination in petunia (Petunia hybrida L.). Mutant plants lacking chalcone synthase (CHS), which catalyzes the first committed step in flavonoid synthesis, do not accumulate flavonols and are self-sterile. The mutant pollen can be induced to germinate by supplementing it with kaempferol, a flavonol aglycone, either at the time of pollination or by add...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS The arabinogalactan protein (AGP) gene family is involved in plant reproduction. However, little is known about the function of individual AGP genes in pollen development and pollen tube growth. In this study, Brassica campestris male fertility 8 (BcMF8), a putative AGP-encoding gene previously found to be pollen specific in Chinese cabbage (B. campestris ssp. chinensis), wa...

Stable oil bodies were purified from mature lily (Lilium longiflorum Thunb.) pollen. The integrity of pollen oil bodies was maintained via electronegative repulsion and steric hindrance possibly provided by their surface proteins. Immunodetection revealed that a major protein of 18 kDa was exclusively present in pollen oil bodies and massively accumulated in late stages of pollen maturation. Ac...

Silene alba, a perennial, dioecious plant, produces flowers that open in the evening and can remain open and receptive to pollination for up to 5 d, though in hot and dry conditions the flowers will wilt during the day only to reopen night after night. In the field, it is visited by two different kinds of pollinators with differential success: moths visit the flowers at night, and their movemen...

Introduction Although much has been added to our knowledge concerning the requirements for pollen germination and pollen tube growth in recent years (1, 2, 4, 10, 17, 18), very little progress has been made in studying chemotropism of pollen tubes. Literature dealing with this subject prior to 1924 has been reviewed by BRINK (3). There is an obvious lack of agreement among the different workers...

18 The effect of the pollination time and of the pollen origin was studied in three self-compatible 19 and late-blooming almond genotypes in order to evaluate their effect on fruit set and yield. 20 The full self-compatibility of the three genotypes was clearly assessed as fruit sets after self21 pollination were similar to those obtained after cross-pollination with pollen from two 22 differen...

Pollen deposition and pollen tube formation are key components of angiosperm reproduction but intraspecific variation in these has rarely been quantified. Documenting and partitioning (populations, plants and flowers) natural variation in these two aspects of plant reproduction can help uncover spatial mosaics of reproductive success and underlying causes. In this study, we assess variation in ...

Boron is an important micronutrient for plants. However, boron is also toxic to cells at high concentrations, although the mechanism of this toxicity is not known. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of boron toxicity on Malus domestica pollen tube growth and its possible regulatory pathway. Our results showed that a high concentration of boron inhibited pollen germination and tube growth a...

28 Research on threats to pollination service in agro-ecosystems has focused primarily on 29 the negative impacts of land use change and agricultural practices, such as insecticide use, on 30 pollinator populations. Insecticide use could also affect the pollination process, through non31 lethal impacts on pollinator attraction and post-pollination processes such as pollen viability or 32 pollen...

A dynamic actin cytoskeleton is essential for pollen germination and tube growth. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying the organization and turnover of the actin cytoskeleton in pollen remain poorly understood. Villin plays a key role in the formation of higher-order structures from actin filaments and in the regulation of actin dynamics in eukaryotic cells. It belongs to the villin/gel...