Affiliation:
1. Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
2. Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, United States
Abstract
During land plant evolution, determinate spore-bearing axes (retained in extant bryophytes such as mosses) were progressively transformed into indeterminate branching shoots with specialized reproductive axes that form flowers. The LEAFY transcription factor, which is required for the first zygotic cell division in mosses and primarily for floral meristem identity in flowering plants, may have facilitated developmental innovations during these transitions. Mapping the LEAFY evolutionary trajectory has been challenging, however, because there is no functional overlap between mosses and flowering plants, and no functional data from intervening lineages. Here, we report a transgenic analysis in the fern Ceratopteris richardii that reveals a role for LEAFY in maintaining cell divisions in the apical stem cells of both haploid and diploid phases of the lifecycle. These results support an evolutionary trajectory in which an ancestral LEAFY module that promotes cell proliferation was progressively co-opted, adapted and specialized as novel shoot developmental contexts emerged.
Funder
Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
Gatsby Charitable Foundation
National Science Foundation
University of Washington
Publisher
eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd
Subject
General Immunology and Microbiology,General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology,General Medicine,General Neuroscience
Cited by
37 articles.
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