We characterized the effects of light on psbD transcription and mRNA levels during chloroplast development in Arabidopsis thaliana. After 6 to 12 hours of illumination of dark-grown seedlings, two psbD mRNAs were detected and their 5’ ends were mapped to positions -550 and -190 bp upstream from the psbD translational start codon. Their kinetics of accumulation resembled the accumulation of chlo...

The red algal order Bangiales has been revised as a result of detailed regional studies and the development of expert local knowledge of Bangiales floras, followed by collaborative global analyses based on wide taxon sampling and molecular analyses. Combined analyses of the nuclear SSU rRNA gene and the plastid RUBISCO LSU (rbcL) gene for 157 Bangiales taxa have been conducted. Fifteen genera o...

The purpose of this study was to assess the phylogenetic utility of a large insertion (3 bp) in the 5.8S gene of nuclear ribosomal DNA (nrDNA) in Cyperaceae and selected Juncaceae. This was done by reconstructing the character evolution of the insertion on a phylogeny derived from rbcL sequences. Results suggest that the insertion was gained once at the base of Cyperaceae followed by multiple l...

The Watanabea clade of the Trebouxiophyceae includes unicellular coccoid green microalgae that mostly thrive in subaerial microhabitats. Recently, a number of new genera and species were described on the basis of the DNA sequence data and morphological observations. The peculiar genus Phyllosiphon, which forms a monophyletic clade within the Watanabea clade, is characterized by forming siphonou...

Phylogenetic relationships in the Gentianales with focus on Loganiaceae sensu lato are evaluated using parsimony analyses of nucleotide sequence data from the plastid genes rbcL and ndhF. Inter- and intrafamilial relationships in the Gentianales, which consist of the families Apocynaceae (including Asclepiadaceae), Gelsemiaceae, Gentianaceae, Loganiaceae, and Rubiaceae, are studied and receive ...

Previous work has demonstrated that the large subunit (rbcL) of ribulose 1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase (RuBisCo) from wheat is cleaved at Gly-329 by the Fe(2+)/ascorbate/H(2)O(2) system (Ishida, H., Makino, A., and Mae, T. (1999) J. Biol. Chem. 274, 5222-5226). In this study, we found that the rbcL could also be cleaved into several other fragments by increasing the incubation time or ...

DNA barcoding is a desirable tool for medicinal product authentication. DNA barcoding is a method for species identification using short DNA sequences that are conserved within species, but variable between species. Unlike animals, there is no single universal DNA barcode locus for plants. Coding markers, matK and rbcL, and noncoding markers, trnH-psbA (chloroplast) and ITS2 (nuclear), have bee...

Direct sequencing of polymerase chain reaction products is now an expanding area of plant systematics and evolution. Within angiosperms the rbcL gene has been widely sequenced and used for inferring plant phylogenies at higher taxonomic levels. Unfortunately rbcL does not usually contain enough information to resolve relationships between closely related genera, such as Hordeum, Triticum, and A...

Hoya (Marsdenieae, Apocynaceae) includes at least 200 species distributed from India to the Pacific Islands. We here infer major species groups in the genus based on combined sequences from the chloroplast atpB-rbcL spacer, the trnL region, and nuclear ribosomal DNA ITS region for 42 taxa of Hoya and close relatives. To assess levels of ITS polymorphism, ITS sequences for a third of the accessi...

Using cheilanthoid ferns, we provide an example of how DNA barcoding approaches can be useful to the horticultural community for keeping plants in the trade accurately identified. We use plastid rbcL, atpA, and trnG-R sequence data to demonstrate that a fern marketed as Cheilanthes wrightii (endemic to the southwestern USA and northern Mexico) in the horticultural trade is, in fact, Cheilanthes...