Natural Variation of Flowering Time and Vernalization Responsiveness in Brachypodium distachyon
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Natural Variation of Flowering Time and Vernalization Responsiveness in Brachypodium distachyon Christopher J. Schwartz & Mark R. Doyle & Antonio J. Manzaneda & Pedro J. Rey & Thomas Mitchell-Olds & Richard M. Amasino
Published online: 7 February 2010 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC. 2010
Abstract Dedicated bioenergy crops require certain characteristics to be economically viable and environmentally sustainable. Perennial grasses, which can provide large amounts of biomass over multiple years, are one option being investigated to grow on marginal agricultural land. Recently, a grass species (Brachypodium distachyon) has been developed as a model to better understand grass physiology and ecology. Here, we report on the flowering time variability of natural Brachypodium accessions in response to temperature and light cues. Changes in both environmental parameters greatly influence when a given accession will flower, and natural Brachypodium accessions broadly group into winter and spring annuals. Similar to what has been discovered in wheat and barley, we find that a portion of the phenotypic variation is associated with changes in expression of orthologs of VRN genes, and thus, VRN genes are a possible target for modifying flowering time in grass family bioenergy crops.
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12155-009-9069-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. C. J. Schwartz : M. R. Doyle : R. M. Amasino (*) Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, Department of Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA e-mail: [email protected] A. J. Manzaneda : T. Mitchell-Olds Institute for Genomic Sciences and Policy, Department of Biology, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708, USA P. J. Rey Departamento de Biologia Animal, Vegetal y Ecologia, Universidad de Jaén, Jaén 23071, Spain
Keywords Biomass . Bioenergy . Brachypodium . Flowering time . Vernalization
Introduction Biomass yield is an important component to consider in any program designed to derive energy from plant material. Plant size and architecture are important biomass yield parameters, and these parameters are often quite variable within a given species. Intraspecies variation in biomass yield can be a product of many factors. One such factor is the timing of the transition from vegetative to reproductive growth. The switch to flowering causes a diversion of resources from the continual production of photosynthetic material (leaves) to the terminal production of reproductive tissue (flowers, seeds, and fruit). Thus, one method to increase biomass yields is to extend the vegetative phase by delaying the transition to flowering. The initiation of flowering during particular seasons can greatly enhance the reproductive success of different plant species. Plants have thus evolved mechanisms to sense seasonal environmental cues that serve as a signal to initiate the conversion from vegetative to reproductive growth. For example, many species flower in
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