Figure 1.

Phylogenetic tree and ZmPHYC expression features. (a) Phylogenetic tree of maize phytochrome homologues. At, Os and Zm represent Arabidopsis thaliana, Oryza sativa, and Zea mays, respectively. Full‐length protein sequences of PHYC were obtained from the Gramene database (http://ensembl.gramene.org/genome_browser/index.html) and used to construct the phylogenetic tree with MEGA7 software using the neighbor‐joining method. ZmPHYC1 and ZmPHYC2 are marked with red rectangle. (b) RT‐qPCR analysis shows that ZmPHYC1 and ZmPHYC2 are expressed in multiple tissues. Six‐leaf stage seedling of the maize inbred line B73 were used to harvest different tissues for RNA extraction. (c and d) Diurnal expression patterns of ZmPHYC1 and ZmPHYC2 in maize inbred line ZC01 leaves under artificial LD (c) and SD (d) conditions. The gray shadows indicate the dark period. The leaves of three‐leaf stage ZC01 seedlings were harvested at different time points under LD or SD conditions. ZT, zeitgeber time. The data are relative to the control gene Tubulin 5 and represent means ± SD of three biological replicates. LD, long‐day; SD, short‐day.