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Sci. STKE, 22 May 2007
Vol. 2007, Issue 387, p. tw179
[DOI: 10.1126/stke.3872007tw179]

EDITORS' CHOICE

Plant Science From Leaf to Flower

Pamela J. Hines

Science, AAAS, Washington, DC 20005, USA

As spring begins, many plants turn to flower under the control of florigen. The molecular nature of florigen has long been unknown, but the signal was known to originate in leaves, and thus had to travel through the plant to the growing buds. Now Corbesier et al. and Tamaki et al. show that it is a protein rather than its coding RNA that is the likely florigen signal that moves within the plant. The florigen RNA and protein are encoded by the FLOWERING LOCUS T gene in Arabidopsis and the Hd3a gene in rice.

L. Corbesier, C. Vincent, S. Jang, F. Fornara, Q. Fan, I. Searle, A. Giakountis, S. Farrona, L. Gissot, C. Turnbull, G. Coupland, FT protein movement contributes to long-distance signaling in floral induction of Arabidopsis. Science 316, 1030-1033 (2007). [Abstract] [Full Text]

S. Tamaki, S. Matsuo, H. L. Wong, S. Yokoi, K. Shimamoto, Hd3a Protein is a mobile flowering signal in rice. Science 316, 1033-1036 (2007). [Abstract] [Full Text]

Citation: P. J. Hines, From Leaf to Flower. Sci. STKE 2007, tw179 (2007).

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