The Arabidopsis thaliana accession Shahdara was identified as a rare naturally occurring mutant that does not liberate seed mucilage on imbibition. The defective locus was found to be allelic to the mum2-1 and mum2-2 mutants. Map-based cloning showed that MUCILAGE-MODIFIED2 (MUM2) encodes the putative beta-D-galactosidase BGAL6. Activity assays demonstrated that one of four major beta-D-galacto...

Despite substantial evidence on the essential roles of cell wall invertase (CWIN) in seed filling, it remains largely unknown how CWIN exerts its regulation early in seed development, a critical stage that sets yield potential. To fill this knowledge gap, we systematically examined the spatial and temporal expression patterns of a major CWIN gene, GhCWIN1, in cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) seeds f...

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been reported to be involved in the development of maize plant. However, few focused on seed development of maize. Here, we identified 753 lncRNA candidates in maize genome from six seed samples. Similar to the mRNAs, lncRNAs showed tissue developmental stage specific and differential expression, indicating their putative role in seed development. Increasing ...

Factors affecting the density and distribution of yellow-poplar regeneration after a single growing season prescribed fire were studied in mature upland oak stands in the southern Appalachian Mountains. In burned and unburned stands, density of one and two year old yellow-poplar seedlings was inventoried within 50 m from isolated yellow-poplar canopy seed trees in response to distance from seed...

Fire plays an important ecological role in Mediterranean-type ecosystems. Many Mediterranean plant species exhibit enhanced germination capacity when exposed to heat. In the present study, the effect of high temperatures and exposure times on germination of Turkish red pine (Pinus brutia) was analyzed in order to reveal the response of seeds to fire and the implications on species regeneration....

The seed, the reproductive unit of angiosperms, is generally protected by the seed coat. The seed coat is made of one or two integuments, each comprising two epidermal cells layers and, in some cases, extra sub-epidermal cell layers. The thickness of the seed-coat affects several aspects of seed biology such as dormancy, germination and mortality. In Arabidopsis, the inner integument displays o...

Seeds are multi-generational structures containing a small embryonic plant enclosed in layers of diverse parental origins. The evolution of seeds was a pinnacle in an evolutionary trend towards a progressive retention of embryos and gametes within parental tissue. This strategy, which dates back to the first land plants, allowed an increased protection and nourishing of the developing embryo. F...

Sputter deposited MgO thin films with the B1 crystal structure and ~002! film texture are used as seed layers to improve the texture and magnetic properties of the CoCrPt/Cr magnetic thin films on glass substrates for longitudinal recording. The desired ~002! textured Cr underlayers are usually obtained by sputtering Cr onto heated substrates. However, it is found that the MgO seed layers can i...

INTRODUCTION The water-level fluctuation in the Three Gorges Reservoir Region has changed dramatically as a result of the hydroelectric project for flood control and power generation. The riparian seasonal hydrological environment also has changed from summer flooding with winter drought to summer drought with winter flooding. The changes of riparian seed bank and vegetation were investigated t...

The ability of Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) and Neuro-Fuzzy neural networks to classify corn seed varieties based on mixed morphological and color Features has been evaluated that would be helpful for automation of corn handling. This research was done in Islamic Azad University, Shahr-e-Rey Branch, during 2011 on 5 main corn varieties were grown in different environments of Iran. A total of 12...