Plant cell suspensions provide a model to study the apoplast and to monitor metabolic and cell cycle-related changes. Bömer et al. frame a case study for the stable transformation of Arabidopsis cell cultures identifying CORONATINE INSENSITIVE 1 (COI1)-dependent changes in cell wall proteins, cell division and expansion, and availability of metabolites. A role for methyl […]

Root mechanical traits, including tensile strength (Tr), tensile strain (εr) and modulus of elasticity (Er), are key functional traits that help characterize plant anchorage and the physical contribution of vegetation to landslides and erosion. The variability in these traits is high among tree fine roots and is poorly understood. Mao et al. explore the variation […]

Separate sexes and sex chromosomes evolved independently many times in plants. As well as the XY system humans have, some plants have a ZW system. But why do some plants bother with having separate sexes? Structural studies of sex chromosomes are now being followed up by functional studies that are gradually shedding light on the […]

It has been reported that low temperatures and the plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) induce the expression of CBF/DREB1 transcription factors in vegetative tissues and seedlings of Vitis vinifera and Vitis riparia and that foliar applications of ABA to V. vinifera increase the freezing tolerance or cold-hardiness of dormant buds. However, the combined effect of […]

Pyroloids, forest sub-shrubs of the Ericaceae family, are an important model for their mixotrophic nutrition, which mixes carbon from photosynthesis and from their mycorrhizal fungi. They have medical uses but are difficult to cultivate ex situ; in particular, their dust seeds contain undifferentiated, few-celled embryos, whose germination is normally fully supported by fungal partners. Their […]

As angiosperms became one of the megadiverse groups of macroscopic eukaryotes, they forged modern ecosystems and promoted the evolution of extant terrestrial biota. Unequal distribution of species among lineages suggests that diversification, the process that ultimately determines species richness, acted differentially through angiosperm evolution. Magallón et al. investigate how angiosperms became megadiverse by identifying the […]

Identifying the processes that generate and maintain biodiversity requires understanding of how evolutionary processes interact with abiotic conditions to structure communities. Edaphic gradients are strongly associated with floristic patterns but, compared with climatic gradients, have received relatively little attention. Muscarella et al. asked: How does the phylogenetic composition of palm communities vary along edaphic gradients […]

Archipelagos provide a valuable framework for investigating phenotypic evolution under different levels of geographical isolation. García-Verdugo et al. analysed two co-distributed, widespread plant lineages to examine if incipient island differentiation follows parallel patterns of variation in traits related to dispersal and colonization. The authors sampled twenty-one populations of two anemochorous Canarian endemics, Kleinia neriifolia and […]

Flower colour plays a major role in the attraction and decision-making of pollinators. Different functional groups of pollinators tend to prefer different flower colours, and therefore may lead to different flower colour compositions among different communities depending on the visual system of the dominant pollinators. However, few studies have investigated the linkage between pollinator fauna […]

The presence of a polar auxin transport stream has long been correlated with the differentiation and patterning of vascular cells across vascular plants. As our understanding of auxin transport and vascular development has grown, so too has evidence for the correlation between these processes. However, a clear understanding of the cellular and molecular mechanisms driving […]

For symbiotic organisms, their colonization and spread across remote oceanic islands should favour generalists. Plants that form obligate symbiotic associations with microbes dominate island ecosystems, but the relationship between island inhabitance and symbiotic specificity is unclear, especially in the tropics. To fill this gap, Swift et al. examined the mycorrhizal specificity of the Hawaiian endemic […]

The Berg hypothesis proposes that specialized-flower traits experience stronger stabilizing selection than non-floral structures and predicts that variation in specialized-flower traits will be mostly uncorrelated with variation in non-floral traits. Similarly, adaptive-accuracy theory predicts lower variation (as a proportion of the mean) in floral traits than in non-floral ones. Both hypotheses can be extended to […]