Ancient duplications and grass-specific transposition influenced the evolution of LEAFY transcription factor genes

Gao, Bei; Chen, Moxian; Li, Xiaoshuang; Zhang, Jianhua

doi:10.1038/s42003-019-0469-4

Cited by 21 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 75 publications

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“…AfLFY was also detected in roots, stems, leaves and young flower buds. This various expression pattern in the LFY homologs suggests the existence of a functional divergence and differentiated regulatory mechanisms associated with the flowers of different plants 33,65 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…The majority of seed-bearing plants examined to date contain one copy of LFY in their genomes 65 . However, multicopy genes have been found in some polyploids (e. g., eucalyptus, Monterey pine, and chrysanthemum) 30,36,63,66,67 , suggesting that LFY gene has experienced ancient transient duplications events, and that duplicated paralogues were promptly lost in most land plants thus maintaining LFY as a single copy 65 . In our study, two haplotypes were identified in six clones from A. frutescens; they shared more than 94% identity and were in the same clade, which indicated that gene flow might occur in A. frutescens.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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AfLFY, a LEAFY homolog in Argyranthemum frutescens, controls flowering time and leaf development

2020

Sci Rep

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Flowering is important for plant propagation and survival, and it is also closely related to human life. Identifying the molecular mechanisms underlying flower development is essential for plant improvement and breeding. Flower development is a complex physiological process that is regulated by multiple genes. LFY genes play important roles in the floral meristem transition and act as crucial integrators in regulating the floral gene network. Argyranthemum frutescens is an ornamental species cultivated for floral displays, yet little is known about molecular mechanisms driving its flower development. In this study, the LEAFY gene homologue, AfLFY, was identified and cloned from A. frutescens, and its role and expression patterns were characterized. Two distinct copies of AfLFY were found in the A. frutescens genome and both sequences contained a 1248 bp open reading frame that encoded 415 amino acids. The putative protein sequences have a typical LFY family domain. In addition, AfLFY was expressed at the highest levels in young leaves of the vegetative stage and in the shoot apical bud meristem of the reproductive stage. Phylogenetic analysis showed that AfLFY was most closely related to DFL from Chrysanthemum lavandulifolium. Subcellular localization studies revealed that AfLFY localized to the nucleus. Heterologous expression of AfLFY in transgenic tobacco plants shortened its period of vegetative growth, converted the lateral meristems into terminal flowers and promoted precocious flowering. In addition, transgenic plants exhibited obvious morphological changes in leaf shape. qRT-PCR analysis indicated that the expression levels genes related to flowering, FT, SOC1, and AP1 were significantly upregulated in AfLFY transgenic plants. Our findings suggested that the AfLFY gene plays a vital role in promoting flowering and leaf development in A. frutescens. These results laid a foundation for us to understand the mechanism of AfLFY in regulation flowering, and the results will be helpful in improving A. frutescens through molecular breeding.Flowering is a vital component of the plant life cycle that influences the success of plant reproduction. The transition from vegetative to reproductive development occurs in response to various endogenous and exogenous cues, and these cues are integrated by a complex molecular network 1-3 . Many floral integrator genes are involved in this molecular network, such as FLOWERING LOCUST (FT) and SUPPRESSOR OF OVEREXPRESSION OF CONSTANS 1 (SOC1), which work with the floral meristem identity gene LEAFY (LFY), to initiate the growth of floral meristems 4-7 . CONSTANS (CO) mediates the floral process in the photoperiod pathway and activates LFY expression directly or indirectly through other floral integrators [8][9][10] .LFY genes were initially described as floral meristem identity genes in Antirrhinum and Arabidopsis 11,12 , and were later shown to act as genetic switches directing the transition from inflorescence meristems to flower meristems 13 . Overexpression of LFY homologs s...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

AfLFY, a LEAFY homolog in Argyranthemum frutescens, controls flowering time and leaf development

2020

Sci Rep

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“…Even in algae, mosses and ferns, LFY possesses a Sterile Alpha Motif domain, a highly conserved eukaryotic oligomerization domain [54]. The LFY family did not follow a classical expansion scheme and duplications were rarely retained except at the base of liverworts/moss and in gymnosperms, but the reasons for this remain elusive [55].…”

Section: Long Range Evolution Of Floral Tfsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contrasted evolutionary trajectories of plant transcription factors

Lai¹,

Chahtane²,

Martín-Arevalillo³

et al. 2020

Current Opinion in Plant Biology

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Because of their prominent roles in plant development, transcription factors (TF) play central roles as drivers of innovation in the evolution of the green lineage (viridiplantae). The advent of massive sequencing combined with comparative genetics/genomics allows a rigorous investigation of how TF families have contributed to plant diversification from charophyte algae to bryophytes to angiosperms. Here, we review recent progress on TF family reconstruction and the identification of distantly related TFs present throughout the evolutionary timeline from algae to angiosperms. These data provide examples of contrasting evolutionary trajectories of TF families and illustrate how conserved TFs adopt diverse roles over the course of evolution.

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“…The structure of this gene is relatively simple and well conserved in seed plants (Frohlich & Meyerowitz, 1997;Ma et al, 2016). Previous studies have shown that LFY exists as a single copy in most plants, even in the polyploid species (Riechmann & Ratcliffe, 2000;Shiu et al, 2005;Gao et al, 2019). LFY has been widely utilized to resolve relationships within angiosperm groups due to its low-copy and high nucleotide substitution rate (Dornelas & Rodriguez, 2006;Theissen & Melzer, 2007;Harris et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The LEAFY ( LFY ) gene was initially described in Antirrhinum majus and Arabidopsis thaliana (Coen et al, 1990; Schultz & Haughn, 1991) as a floral meristem identity gene that encodes a plant‐specific DNA‐binding transcription factor and plays a key role in regulating floral development (Moon et al, 2005; Gao et al, 2019; Hu et al, 2020). The structure of this gene is relatively simple and well conserved in seed plants (Frohlich & Meyerowitz, 1997; Ma et al, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Origins of cultivars of Chrysanthemum—Evidence from the chloroplast genome and nuclear LFY gene

Zhao

Zhang

et al. 2020

J of Sytematics Evolution

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The origins of cultivated chrysanthemums have attracted considerable attention, but they remain poorly known. Here, we reconstructed the phylogeny of representative well-known cultivars and wild species of the genus Chrysanthemum using chloroplast genomes and the nuclear LEAFY gene. Our results suggest that geographic and ecological factors may determine the opportunities for wild species to be involved in the origin of the cultivars. The wild species C. indicum, C. zawadskii, C. dichrum, C. nankingense, C. argyrophyllum, and C. vestitum were likely directly or indirectly involved as paternal species of most of the chrysanthemum cultivars examined in this study. Yet, the maternal species is supported to be a lineage of an extinct wild Chrysanthemum species and its subsequent cultivars, as all accessions of chrysanthemum cultivars sampled formed a strongly supported clade, distinct from all other species of Chrysanthemum in the plastome tree. Thus, the cultivated chrysanthemums originated from multiple hybridizations involving several paternal species rather than only two or a few wild species, with an extinct species and its subsequent cultivars serving as the maternal parents. This finding is consistent with Chrysanthemum having high rates of hybridization and gene flow, which has been demonstrated within previous studies; nevertheless, it is important to unravel the role of an extinct wild Chrysanthemum species as the ultimate maternal parent species for all the chrysanthemum cultivars. Our results also suggest that C. vestitum from Tianzhu and Funiu Mountains in Anhui and Henan Provinces of China represent two distinct cryptic species.

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Ancient duplications and grass-specific transposition influenced the evolution of LEAFY transcription factor genes

Cited by 21 publications

References 75 publications

AfLFY, a LEAFY homolog in Argyranthemum frutescens, controls flowering time and leaf development

AfLFY, a LEAFY homolog in Argyranthemum frutescens, controls flowering time and leaf development

Contrasted evolutionary trajectories of plant transcription factors

Origins of cultivars of Chrysanthemum—Evidence from the chloroplast genome and nuclear LFY gene

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