Responses to prolonged low-temperature treatment of imbibed seeds (vernalization) were examined in barley (Hordeum vulgare). These occurred in two phases: the perception of prolonged cold, which occurred gradually at low temperatures, and the acceleration of reproductive development, which occurred after vernalization. Expression of the VERNALIZATION1 gene (HvVRN1) increased gradually in germin...

The architecture of the inflorescence, the shoot system that bears the flowers, is a main component of the huge diversity of forms found in flowering plants. Inflorescence architecture has also a strong impact on the production of fruits and seeds, and on crop management, two highly relevant agronomical traits. Elucidating the genetic networks that control inflorescence development, and how the...

FLOWERING LOCUS T (FT) encodes a systemic signal communicating the perception of long day photoperiod from leaves to the shoot apex to induce the floral transition. Transient expression of FT in the phloem companion cells of rosette leaves for one to several days was previously shown to be sufficient to commit plants to flowering. Here we show that partial commitment results in pleiotropic infl...

Maize (Zea mays ssp. mays) and its wild progenitor, teosinte (Z. mays ssp. parviglumis) differ dramatically in inflorescence and plant architecture despite the fact that their evolutionary divergence occurred within the past 10,000 years or less. To elucidate the genetic control of the morphological differences between maize and teosinte, my colleague and I employed quantitative trait locus map...

Maize (Zea mays) plants make different types of vegetative or reproductive branches during development. Branches develop from axillary meristems produced on the flanks of the vegetative or inflorescence shoot apical meristem. Among these branches are the spikelets, short grass-specific structures, produced by determinate axillary spikelet-pair and spikelet meristems. We investigated the mechani...

Coconut inflorescence sap (CIS) is sweet, oyster-white and translucent and was reported to be highly nutritive and a good digestive agent. The chemical composition changes including total sugar, reducing sugar, ethanol, total acidity, volatile acid, amino acid, vitamin C and total phenolic contents of postharvest coconut inflorescence sap (PCIS) were investigated during a 12-day natural ferment...

In this study, the effects of different pruning heights and number of branches left were evaluated to determine the most effective pruning height and optimum number of branches to be left after branch thinning to increase seed yield production of Jatropha curcas. The experiment, which was conducted at the MMSU Experimental Station from 2009-2011, was laid-out in Split plot design and was replic...

Differential organ growth during gravitropic response is caused by differential accumulation of auxin, that is, relative higher auxin concentration in lower flanks than in upper flanks of responding organs. Auxin responsive reporter systems such as DR5::GUS and DR5::GFP have usually been used as indicators of gravitropic response in roots and hypocotyls of Arabidopsis. However, in the infloresc...