Dormancy-specific imprinting underlies maternal inheritance of seed dormancy in Arabidopsis thaliana

  1. Urszula Piskurewicz
  2. Mayumi Iwasaki
  3. Daichi Susaki
  4. Christian Megies
  5. Tetsu Kinoshita
  6. Luis Lopez-Molina  Is a corresponding author
  1. University of Geneva, Switzerland
  2. Yokohama City University, Japan

Abstract

Mature seed dormancy is a vital plant trait preventing germination out of season. In Arabidopsis, the trait can be maternally regulated but the underlying mechanisms sustaining this regulation, its general occurrence and biological significance among accessions is poorly understood. Upon seed imbibition, the endosperm is essential to repress germination of dormant seeds. Investigation of genomic imprinting in the mature seed endosperm led us to identify a novel set of imprinted genes expressed upon seed imbibition. Remarkably, programs of imprinted gene expression are adapted according to the dormancy status of the seed. We provide direct evidence that imprinted genes play a role to regulate germination processes and that preferential maternal allelic expression can implement maternal inheritance of seed dormancy levels.

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Urszula Piskurewicz

    Department of Plant Biology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  2. Mayumi Iwasaki

    Department of Plant Biology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  3. Daichi Susaki

    Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama City University, Yokohama, Japan
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  4. Christian Megies

    Department of Plant Biology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  5. Tetsu Kinoshita

    Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama City University, Yokohama, Japan
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  6. Luis Lopez-Molina

    Department of Plant Biology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
    For correspondence
    Luis.LopezMolina@unige.ch
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-9523-9123

Funding

Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung

  • Urszula Piskurewicz
  • Mayumi Iwasaki
  • Christian Megies
  • Luis Lopez-Molina

Grant in Aid for Scientific Research on innovative area (16H06465,16H06464,and 16K21727)

  • Daichi Susaki
  • Tetsu Kinoshita

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Copyright

© 2016, Piskurewicz et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 3,407
    views
  • 818
    downloads
  • 46
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Urszula Piskurewicz
  2. Mayumi Iwasaki
  3. Daichi Susaki
  4. Christian Megies
  5. Tetsu Kinoshita
  6. Luis Lopez-Molina
(2016)
Dormancy-specific imprinting underlies maternal inheritance of seed dormancy in Arabidopsis thaliana
eLife 5:e19573.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.19573

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.19573

Further reading

    1. Plant Biology
    Yuanyuan Bu, Xingye Dong ... Shenkui Liu
    Research Article Updated

    Urea is intensively utilized as a nitrogen fertilizer in agriculture, originating either from root uptake or from catabolism of arginine by arginase. Despite its extensive use, the underlying physiological mechanisms of urea, particularly its adverse effects on seed germination and seedling growth under salt stress, remain unclear. In this study, we demonstrate that salt stress induces excessive hydrolysis of arginine-derived urea, leading to an increase in cytoplasmic pH within seed radical cells, which, in turn, triggers salt-induced inhibition of seed germination (SISG) and hampers seedling growth. Our findings challenge the long-held belief that ammonium accumulation and toxicity are the primary causes of SISG, offering a novel perspective on the mechanism underlying these processes. This study provides significant insights into the physiological impact of urea hydrolysis under salt stress, contributing to a better understanding of SISG.

    1. Plant Biology
    Xiaoyan Liang, Caifu Jiang
    Insight

    Salt stress delays seed germination in plants by increasing the hydrolysis of arginine-derived urea.