Skip Navigation



JXB Advance Access published online on April 28, 2009
Journal of Experimental Botany, doi:10.1093/jxb/erp102
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow Supplementary Data
Right arrowOA All Versions of this Article:
60/9/2601    most recent
erp102v1
Right arrow E-letters: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when E-letters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Disclaimer
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Arsovski, A. A.
Right arrow Articles by Western, T. L.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Arsovski, A. A.
Right arrow Articles by Western, T. L.
Agricola
Right arrow Articles by Arsovski, A. A.
Right arrow Articles by Western, T. L.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© 2009 The Author(s).
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. This paper is available online free of all access charges (see http://jxb.oxfordjournals.org/open_access.html for further details)

RESEARCH PAPER

MUM ENHANCERS are important for seed coat mucilage production and mucilage secretory cell differentiation in Arabidopsis thaliana

Andrej A. Arsovski1, Maria M. Villota2,3, Owen Rowland2, Rajagopal Subramaniam3 and Tamara L. Western1,*

1Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 1B1
2Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada K1S 5B6
3Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Eastern Cereal and Oilseed Research Centre, Ottawa, ON, Canada K1A 0C6

* To whom correspondence should be addressed: E-mail: tamara.western{at}mcgill.ca

Pollination triggers not only embryo development but also the differentiation of the ovule integuments to form a specialized seed coat. The mucilage secretory cells of the Arabidopsis thaliana seed coat undergo a complex differentiation process in which cell growth is followed by the synthesis and secretion of pectinaceous mucilage. A number of genes have been identified affecting mucilage secretory cell differentiation, including MUCILAGE-MODIFIED4 (MUM4). mum4 mutants produce a reduced amount of mucilage and cloning of MUM4 revealed that it encodes a UDP-L-rhamnose synthase that is developmentally up-regulated to provide rhamnose for mucilage pectin synthesis. To identify additional genes acting in mucilage synthesis and secretion, a screen for enhancers of the mum4 phenotype was performed. Eight mum enhancers (men) have been identified, two of which result from defects in known mucilage secretory cell genes (MUM2 and MYB61). Our results show that, in a mum4 background, mutations in MEN1, MEN4, and MEN5 lead to further reductions in mucilage compared to mum4 single mutants, suggesting that they are involved in mucilage synthesis or secretion. Conversely, mutations in MEN2 and MEN6 appear to affect mucilage release rather than quantity. With the exception of men4, whose single mutant exhibits reduced mucilage, none of these genes have a single mutant phenotype, suggesting that they would not have been identified outside the compromised mum4 background.

Key words: Arabidopsis thaliana, cell wall, germination, MEN, mucilage, MUM4, pectin, RHM2, rhamnogalacturonan I, seed coat

Received 13 November 2008; Revised 20 February 2009 Accepted 11 March 2009


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.