Plant Biology

ECS1 and ECS2 suppress polyspermy and the formation of haploid plants by promoting double fertilization

1. Yanbo Mao
2. Thomas Nakel
3. Isil Erbasol Serbes
4. Saurabh Joshi
5. Dawit G Tekleyohans
6. Thomas Baum
7. Rita Groß-Hardt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment:

  This important study convincingly shows that the endopeptidases ECS1 and ECS2 repress the formation of polyspermy-derived triparental offspring and haploid induction by promoting double fertilization. While the underlying mechanisms remain to be further elucidated, the data presented in this study represent a valuable foundation for understanding the regulation of offspring genome size. This study will be of particular interest to the large community of scientists who are interested in plant reproduction and breeding.

Reviewed by eLife

Lipid bilayer properties potentially contributed to the evolutionary disappearance of betaine lipids in seed plants

1. Stéphanie Bolik
2. Alexander Schlaich
3. Tetiana Mukhina
4. Alberto Amato
5. Olivier Bastien
6. Emanuel Schneck
7. Bruno Demé
8. Juliette Jouhet

Reviewed by Review Commons

NBR1-mediated selective autophagy of ARF7 modulates root branching

1. E Ebstrup
2. J Ansbøl
3. A Paez-Garcia
4. H Culp
5. J Chevalier
6. P Clemmens
7. NS Coll
8. A Moreno-Risueno M
9. E Rodriguez

Reviewed by Review Commons

Plant secondary metabolite-dependent plant-soil feedbacks can improve crop yield in the field

1. Valentin Gfeller
2. Jan Waelchli
3. Stephanie Pfister
4. Gabriel Deslandes-Hérold
5. Fabio Mascher
6. Gaetan Glauser
7. Yvo Aeby
8. Adrien Mestrot
9. Christelle AM Robert
10. Klaus Schlaeppi
11. Matthias Erb

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This study presents findings that are important for understanding plant-soil feedbacks in agriculture. The authors use a large-scale agricultural field experiment to demonstrate the role of root-emitted secondary metabolites in enhancing the yield of the next crop. By using a benzoxazinoid-deficient maize genotype, the authors provide compelling evidence that biomass production and grain yield of several wheat varieties can be increased when grown in soil conditioned by maize plants able to release benzoxazinoids.

Reviewed by eLife

Plant Arbovirus Mobilizes a Vector Salivary Protein to Initiate Plant Infection

1. Jing Zhao
2. Jie Yang
3. Xiangyi Meng
4. Rongxiang Fang
5. Yan Huo
6. Lili Zhang

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This study presents a useful set of experiments to test how a salivary protein might facilitate planthopper-transmitted rice stripe virus infection by interfering with callose deposition. If the conclusions can be confirmed, the study will enhance our understanding of the mechanisms mediating tripartite virus-insect vector-plant interactions and would be of general interest in plant science research. Whereas most experimental data is compelling, the conclusions rely on inadequate evidence for the salivary protein carbonic anhydrase being present two weeks post injection in the plant, which seems unlikely.

Reviewed by eLife

Adenylnucleotide-mediated binding of the PII-like protein SbtB contributes to controlling activity of the cyanobacterial bicarbonate transporter SbtA

1. Britta Förster
2. Bratati Mukherjee
3. Loraine M. Rourke
4. Joe A. Kaczmarski
5. Colin J. Jackson
6. G. Dean Price

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This study is of fundamental importance, addressing the regulation of the carbon concentrating mechanism in cyanobacteria. It is a well-controlled investigation of low affinity regulatory binding of small molecules, processes that are typically difficult to examine. The work provides compelling evidence that the adenylate pool, rather than any single metabolite, regulates a key bicarbonate transporter (SbtA) to provide efficient bicarbonate supply while preventing futile cycling that can result from escape of unfixed CO2.

Reviewed by eLife

Genome editing of an African elite rice variety confers resistance against endemic and emerging Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae strains

1. Van Schepler-Luu
2. Coline Sciallano
3. Melissa Stiebner
4. Chonghui Ji
5. Gabriel Boulard
6. Amadou Diallo
7. Florence Auguy
8. Si Nian Char
9. Yugander Arra
10. Kyrylo Schenstnyi
11. Marcel Buchholzer
12. Eliza PI Loo
13. Atugonza L Bilaro
14. David Lihepanyama
15. Mohammed Mkuya
16. Rosemary Murori
17. Ricardo Oliva
18. Sebastien Cunnac
19. Bing Yang
20. Boris Szurek
21. Wolf B Frommer

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable study shows that new, virulent genotypes of Xanthomonas oryze pv. oryzae, that are similar to strains present in east Asia, cause outbreaks of bacterial blight of rice in Tanzania. The authors' use of CRISPR-based gene editing on multiple pathogen targets in an elite African rice variety to create lines resistant to both endemic and emerging pathogen strains in Africa makes for a compelling contribution to meet this alarming development. The work describing the new strains of the pathogen is solid but could be stronger if there were genome sequence data for all strains examined and a clearer presentation of recent disease outbreaks and their severity.

Reviewed by eLife

Orchid seed germination through auto-activation of mycorrhizal symbiosis signaling regulated by gibberellin

1. Chihiro Miura
2. Yuki Furui
3. Tatsuki Yamamoto
4. Yuri Kanno
5. Masaya Honjo
6. Katsushi Yamaguchi
7. Kenji Suetsugu
8. Takahiro Yagame
9. Mitsunori Seo
10. Shuji Shigenobu
11. Masahide Yamato
12. Hironori Kaminaka

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

The photosystem I supercomplex from a primordial green alga Ostreococcus tauri harbors three light-harvesting complex trimers

1. Asako Ishii
2. Jianyu Shan
3. Xin Sheng
4. Eunchul Kim
5. Akimasa Watanabe
6. Makio Yokono
7. Chiyo Noda
8. Chihong Song
9. Kazuyoshi Murata
10. Zhenfeng Liu
11. Jun Minagawa

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  The fundamental work represents an important contribution to our understanding of the diversity of photosynthetic mechanisms across the branches of phototrophic life, with the first high-resolution structure (2.9 Å) of a photosynthetic complex from a primitive green alga. This is a valuable resource for understanding function and evolution of light-harvesting antennas. The evidence is convincing in suggesting that the mechanism found here is distinct from the classical antenna state transitions seen in other organisms studied thus far.

Reviewed by eLife

Association Mapping Across a Multitude of Traits Collected in Diverse Environments Identifies Pleiotropic Loci in Maize

1. Ravi V. Mural
2. Guangchao Sun
3. Marcin Grzybowski
4. Michael C. Tross
5. Hongyu Jin
6. Christine Smith
7. Linsey Newton
8. Carson M. Andorf
9. Margaret R. Woodhouse
10. Addie M. Thompson
11. Brandi Sigmon
12. James C. Schnable

Reviewed by GigaScience