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SUMMARY:The evolution of branching patterns in plants - Jill Harrison (Uni
 versity of Cambridge)
DTSTART:20140305T130000Z
DTEND:20140305T140000Z
UID:TALK50100@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Jeremy Solly
DESCRIPTION:Plants colonized land over 450 million years ago\, and indepen
 dently underwent architectural diversification in the gametophyte and spor
 ophyte stages of the life cycle. Branching is a key contributor to plant a
 rchitecture which determines how plants fill space and respond to their en
 vironment. The earliest land plant sporophytes did not branch\, and the mo
 lecular mechanisms regulating gametophytic branching are largely unknown. 
 Although land plants have a shared genetic toolkit\, candidate hormonal re
 gulators of branching have divergent reported functions in a moss. I will 
 present a simple model which can reproduce gametophytic shoot branching pa
 tterns in Physcomitrella by integrating a cue from the gametophore tips wi
 th global and local sensitivities to the cue elsewhere in the plant if the
  transport capacity for that cue is unbiased\, and perturbing auxin\, cyto
 kinin and strigolactone biosynthesis phenocopies predictions of the model.
  Although perturbing the function of Physcomitrella homologues of PIN-FORM
 ED1 auxin transporters has little effect on gametophytic branching\, pinb 
 mutants have branched sporophytes. Our results show that three key conserv
 ed hormone pathways were recruited independently to regulate gametophytic 
 branching in a moss\, but that these cues may be integrated in a novel man
 ner. Perturbing PIN-mediated auxin transport in moss sporophytes can induc
 e a novel phenotype previously only recorded in rare natural variants and 
 the fossil record.
LOCATION:Part II Lecture Theatre\, Department of Zoology
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