Developing a method for customized induction of flowering

BMC Biotechnology

Research Article

Rebecca Laurie¹  Richard Macknight¹  Martin Balcerowicz²  Chin Chin Yeoh²  Joanna Putterill² 

[1] Department of Biochemistry, University of Otago, PO Box 56, 9054, Dunedin, New Zealand;Plant Molecular Sciences, School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand;

关键词: Ethanol Treatment;    Ethanol Vapour;    Late Flowering Phenotype;    Early Flowering Phenotype;    Artificial microRNA;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6750-11-36

 received in 2010-09-22, accepted in 2011-04-11,  发布年份 2011

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe ability to induce flowering on demand is of significant biotechnological interest. FT protein has been recently identified as an important component of the mobile flowering hormone, florigen, whose function is conserved across the plant kingdom. We therefore focused on manipulation of both endogenous and heterologous FT genes to develop a floral induction system where flowering would be inhibited until it was induced on demand. The concept was tested in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana (Arabidopsis).ResultsOur starting point was plants with strongly delayed flowering due to silencing of FT with an artificial microRNA directed at FT (amiR-FT) [1]. First, we showed that constitutive expression of a heterologous FT gene (FTa1), from the model legume Medicago truncatula, (Medicago) was able to rescue the amiR-FT late-flowering phenotype. In order to induce flowering in a controlled way, the FTa1 gene was then expressed under the control of an alcohol-inducible promoter in the late flowering amiR-FT plants. Upon exposure to ethanol, FTa1 was rapidly up regulated and this resulted in the synchronous induction of flowering.ConclusionsWe have thus demonstrated a controlled-inducible flowering system using a novel combination of endogenous and heterologous FT genes. The universal florigenic nature of FT suggests that this type of system should be applicable to crops of economic value where flowering control is desirable.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Yeoh et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2011. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.