Skip to main content
PMC home page
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences logoLink to Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
. 2004 Feb 7;271(1536):311–316. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2003.2544

The phenotype of Arabidopsis ovule mutants mimics the morphology of primitive seed plants.

Sung Ok Park 1, Soon Hwang 1, Bernard A Hauser 1
PMCID: PMC1691585  PMID: 15058443

Abstract

In seed plants, the ovule is the female reproductive structure, which surrounds and nourishes the gametophyte and embryo. This investigation describes the PRETTY FEW SEEDS2 (PFS2) locus, which regulates ovule patterning. The pfs2 mutant exhibited developmental defects in the maternal integuments and gametophyte. This mutation was inherited as a maternal trait, indicating that gametophyte defects resulted from ovule patterning aberrations. Specifically, the boundary between the chalaza and the nucellus, two regions of the ovule primordia, shifted towards the distal end of pfs2 ovule primordia. Results indicated that the PFS2 locus could: (i) be involved in the development of either the nucellus or the chalaza; or (ii) establish a boundary between these two regions. Examination of genetic interactions of the pfs2 mutation with other well-characterized ovule loci indicates that this locus affects integument morphogenesis. Interestingly, the pfs2 inner no outer and pfs2 strubbelig double mutants had inner integuments that appeared similar to their ancestral precursor. The fossil record indicates that the inner integument evolved by fusion of sterilized sporangia or branches around a central megasporangium. The question of whether the structures observed in these double mutants are homologous or merely analogous to the ancestral precursors of the inner integument is discussed.

Full Text

The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (964.8 KB).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Andrews H. N. Early Seed Plants. Science. 1963 Nov 15;142(3594):925–931. doi: 10.1126/science.142.3594.925. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Balasubramanian S., Schneitz K. NOZZLE regulates proximal-distal pattern formation, cell proliferation and early sporogenesis during ovule development in Arabidopsis thaliana. Development. 2000 Oct;127(19):4227–4238. doi: 10.1242/dev.127.19.4227. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Balasubramanian Sureshkumar, Schneitz Kay. NOZZLE links proximal-distal and adaxial-abaxial pattern formation during ovule development in Arabidopsis thaliana. Development. 2002 Sep;129(18):4291–4300. doi: 10.1242/dev.129.18.4291. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Elliott R. C., Betzner A. S., Huttner E., Oakes M. P., Tucker W. Q., Gerentes D., Perez P., Smyth D. R. AINTEGUMENTA, an APETALA2-like gene of Arabidopsis with pleiotropic roles in ovule development and floral organ growth. Plant Cell. 1996 Feb;8(2):155–168. doi: 10.1105/tpc.8.2.155. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Gasser C. S., Broadhvest J., Hauser B. A. GENETIC ANALYSIS OF OVULE DEVELOPMENT. Annu Rev Plant Physiol Plant Mol Biol. 1998 Jun;49(NaN):1–24. doi: 10.1146/annurev.arplant.49.1.1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Grossniklaus U., Schneitz K. The molecular and genetic basis of ovule and megagametophyte development. Semin Cell Dev Biol. 1998 Apr;9(2):227–238. doi: 10.1006/scdb.1997.0214. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Klucher K. M., Chow H., Reiser L., Fischer R. L. The AINTEGUMENTA gene of Arabidopsis required for ovule and female gametophyte development is related to the floral homeotic gene APETALA2. Plant Cell. 1996 Feb;8(2):137–153. doi: 10.1105/tpc.8.2.137. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Kobe B., Deisenhofer J. The leucine-rich repeat: a versatile binding motif. Trends Biochem Sci. 1994 Oct;19(10):415–421. doi: 10.1016/0968-0004(94)90090-6. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Konieczny A., Ausubel F. M. A procedure for mapping Arabidopsis mutations using co-dominant ecotype-specific PCR-based markers. Plant J. 1993 Aug;4(2):403–410. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-313x.1993.04020403.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Lander E. S., Green P., Abrahamson J., Barlow A., Daly M. J., Lincoln S. E., Newberg L. A., Newburg L. MAPMAKER: an interactive computer package for constructing primary genetic linkage maps of experimental and natural populations. Genomics. 1987 Oct;1(2):174–181. doi: 10.1016/0888-7543(87)90010-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Meister Robert J., Kotow Louren M., Gasser Charles S. SUPERMAN attenuates positive INNER NO OUTER autoregulation to maintain polar development of Arabidopsis ovule outer integuments. Development. 2002 Sep;129(18):4281–4289. doi: 10.1242/dev.129.18.4281. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Modrusan Z., Reiser L., Feldmann K. A., Fischer R. L., Haughn G. W. Homeotic Transformation of Ovules into Carpel-like Structures in Arabidopsis. Plant Cell. 1994 Mar;6(3):333–349. doi: 10.1105/tpc.6.3.333. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Paul R. N. The use of thionin and acridine orange in staining semithin sections of plant material embedded in epoxy resin. Stain Technol. 1980 May;55(3):195–196. doi: 10.3109/10520298009067240. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Robinson-Beers K., Pruitt R. E., Gasser C. S. Ovule Development in Wild-Type Arabidopsis and Two Female-Sterile Mutants. Plant Cell. 1992 Oct;4(10):1237–1249. doi: 10.1105/tpc.4.10.1237. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Schneitz K., Hülskamp M., Kopczak S. D., Pruitt R. E. Dissection of sexual organ ontogenesis: a genetic analysis of ovule development in Arabidopsis thaliana. Development. 1997 Apr;124(7):1367–1376. doi: 10.1242/dev.124.7.1367. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  16. Spurr A. R. A low-viscosity epoxy resin embedding medium for electron microscopy. J Ultrastruct Res. 1969 Jan;26(1):31–43. doi: 10.1016/s0022-5320(69)90033-1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  17. Villanueva J. M., Broadhvest J., Hauser B. A., Meister R. J., Schneitz K., Gasser C. S. INNER NO OUTER regulates abaxial- adaxial patterning in Arabidopsis ovules. Genes Dev. 1999 Dec 1;13(23):3160–3169. doi: 10.1101/gad.13.23.3160. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  18. Yang W. C., Ye D., Xu J., Sundaresan V. The SPOROCYTELESS gene of Arabidopsis is required for initiation of sporogenesis and encodes a novel nuclear protein. Genes Dev. 1999 Aug 15;13(16):2108–2117. doi: 10.1101/gad.13.16.2108. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences are provided here courtesy of The Royal Society

RESOURCES