Plant Physiology Preview
Published on June 11, 2008; 10.1104/pp.108.121541
OPEN ACCESS ARTICLE
Received April 19, 2008
Accepted June 2, 2008
The relationship between auxin transport and maize branching
Andrea Gallavotti , Yan Yang , Robert J. Schmidt , and David Jackson *
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1 Bungtown Rd, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, 11724; University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Dr., La Jolla, CA, 92093-0116; University of Amsterdam, Kruislaan 318, Amsterdam, 1098SM, The Netherlands
* Corresponding author; email: jacksond{at}cshl.edu.
Maize plants (Zea mays) 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 mechanism of branching in maize by making transgenic plants expressing a native expressed endogenous auxin efflux transporter (ZmPIN1a) fused to YFP, and a synthetic auxin-responsive promoter (DR5rev) driving RFP. By imaging these plants we found that all maize branching events during vegetative and reproductive development appear to be regulated by the creation of auxin response maxima through the activity of polar auxin transporters. We also found that the auxin transporter ZmPIN1a is functional as it can rescue the polar auxin transport defects of the Arabidopsis pin1-3 mutant. Based on this, and on the groundbreaking analysis in Arabidospis and other species, we conclude that branching mechanisms are conserved, and can, in addition, explain the formation of axillary meristems (spikelet-pair and spikelet meristems) that are unique to grasses. We also found that BARREN STALK1 (BA1) is required for the creation of auxin response maxima at the flanks of the inflorescence meristem, suggesting a role in the initiation of polar auxin transport for axillary meristem formation. Based on our results we propose a general model for branching during maize inflorescence development.
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