Cytokinins have been implicated in normal plant growth and development. These bioactive molecules are essential for cell production and expansion in higher plants. Carrot is an Apiaceae vegetable with great value and undergoes significant size changes over the process of plant growth. However, cytokinin accumulation and its potential roles in carrot growth have not been elucidated. To address t...

In many organisms, including plants, nucleic acid bases and derivatives such as caffeine are transported across the plasma membrane. Cytokinins, important hormones structurally related to adenine, are produced mainly in root apices, from where they are translocated to shoots to control a multitude of physiological processes. Complementation of a yeast mutant deficient in adenine uptake (fcy2) w...

Understanding the complete picture of floral transition is still impaired by the fact that physiological studies mainly concern plant species whose genetics is poorly known, and vice versa. Arabidopsis thaliana has been successfully used to unravel signalling pathways by genetic and molecular approaches, but analyses are still required to determine the physiological signals involved in the cont...

Bud outgrowth is a key process in the elaboration of yield and visual quality in rose crops. Although light intensity is well known to affect bud outgrowth, little is known on the mechanisms involved in this regulation. The objective of this work was to test if the control of bud outgrowth pattern along the stem by photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD) is mediated by sugars, cytokinins and/...

The gynoecium is the female reproductive system in flowering plants. It is a complex structure formed by different tissues, some that are essential for reproduction and others that facilitate the fertilization process and nurture and protect the developing seeds. The coordinated development of these different tissues during the formation of the gynoecium is important for reproductive success. B...

Cytokinins play important roles in legume-rhizobia symbiosis. Here we report isolation of six genes encoding isopentenyl transferase (IPT) from Lotus japonicus, which catalyze the rate-limiting step of cytokinin biosynthesis. The LjIPT3 gene was found to be up-regulated in infected roots and mature nodules. Histochemical analysis demonstrated expression of Pro(LjIPT3):GUS (β-glucuronidase) in v...

We examined the effects of various adenine analogues on the growth and differentiation of human myeloid leukemia HL-60 cells. Some of these analogues inhibit growth and induce nitroblue tetrazolium reducing activity in HL-60 cells. Cytokinins such as kinetin, isopentenyladenine, and benzyladenine were very effective in inducing nitroblue tetrazolium reduction and morphological changes in the ce...

The social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum diverged from the line leading to animals shortly after the separation of plants and animals but it retained characteristics of both kingdoms. A GABA(B)-like receptor and a peptide, SDF-2, with homologs found only in animals, control sporulation, while cytokinins, which act as hormones in plants, keep spores dormant. When SDF-2 binds its receptor DhkA,...