Journal article

TRICHOME BIREFRINGENCE and its homolog AT5G01360 encode plant-specific DUF231 proteins required for cellulose biosynthesis in arabidopsis

V Bischoff, S Nita, L Neumetzler, D Schindelasch, A Urbain, R Eshed, S Persson, D Delmer, WR Scheible

Plant Physiology | Published : 2010

Abstract

The Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) trichome birefringence (tbr) mutant has severely reduced crystalline cellulose in trichomes, but the molecular nature of TBR was unknown. We determined TBR to belong to the plant-specific DUF231 domain gene family comprising 46 members of unknown function in Arabidopsis. The genes harbor another plant-specific domain, called the TBL domain, which contains a conserved GDSL motif known from some esterases/lipases. TBR and TBR-like3 (TBL3) are transcriptionally coordinated with primary and secondary CELLULOSE SYNTHASE (CESA) genes, respectively. The tbr and tbl3 mutants hold lower levels of crystalline cellulose and have altered pectin composition in trich..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Awarded by German Science Foundation


Awarded by European Union


Funding Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the German Science Foundation (grant no. SCHE 548/2), the Max Planck Society, and the European Union Framework Program 6 (Cellulose Architecture Systems Biology for Plant Innovation Creation grant no. NEST-CT-2004-028974 to V. B.).