Studies on the molecular mechanisms of seed germination

Abstract

Seed germination that begins with imbibition and ends with radicle emergence is the first step for plant growth. Successful germination is not only crucial for seedling establishment but also important for crop yield. After being dispersed from mother plant, seed undergoes continuous desiccation in ecosystem and selects proper environment to trigger germination. Owing to the contribution of transcriptomic, proteomic, and molecular biological studies, molecular aspect of seed germination is elucidated well in Arabidopsis. Recently, more and more proteomic and genetic studies concerning cereal seed germination were performed on rice (Oryza sativa) and barley (Hordeum vulgare), which possess completely different seed structure and domestication background with Arabidopsis. In this review, both the common features and the distinct mechanisms of seed germination are compared among different plant species including Arabidopsis, rice, and maize. These features include morphological changes, cell and its related structure recovery, metabolic activation, hormone behavior, and transcription and translation activation. This review will provide more comprehensive insights into the molecular mechanisms of seed germination.

Temporal Analyses of Barley Malting Stages Using Shotgun Proteomics

“…Further, examination of the GO cellular compartment category, among the proteins unique to Steep indicated, enrichment for proteins associated with plasma membrane, mitochondria, golgi apparatus, vacuole, and ribosome. This is in line with earlier reports on massive membrane reorganization processes during germination in other plants . In the GO for biological process, proteins associated with cell growth, cellular compartment organization, lipid metabolism, nitrogen compound metabolism, translation, response to biotic and abiotic stress were significantly enriched.…”

Sugarcane Water Stress Tolerance Mechanisms and Its Implications on Developing Biotechnology Solutions

“…The accumulation of ABA under drought conditions triggers multiple adaptive responses. For instance, ABA has been implicated to stomatal closure, reduction of leaf and stem growth, production of deeper root system, higher root and shoot hydraulic conductivity, assimilate remobilization, induction of senescence, maintenance of turgor pressure, expression of antioxidant proteins and seed dormancy (Zeevaart and Creelman, 1988; Chaves et al, 2003; Parent et al, 2009; Han and Yang, 2015). …”

Small RNA and degradome profiling reveals miRNA regulation in the seed germination of ancient eudicot Nelumbo nucifera

“…It is a complex physiological and biochemical process and previous studies suggested a role for miRNAs in seed germination [26–29]. Using small RNA sequencing, the miRNA expression patterns in rice embryos at 0, 12 and 24 h after imbibition showed that osa-miR159f, osa-miR166l and osa-319b were predominantly expressed in rice seeds [27].…”