Research report 2017 - Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research

Learning how barley flowers release pollen to bring on the agriculture of the future

Authors
Acosta, Ivan F.; Przybyl, Marine
Departments
Nachwuchsgruppe Regulation of stamen maturation in barley and Arabidopsis
Summary
To improve crop quality and yield, breeders need to control the fertility of stamens, the male organs that produce pollen within sacs called anthers. For example, it would be ideal to manipulate at will the release of pollen from anthers. However, this firstly requires a detailed understanding of how anther cells themselves activate pollen release. In barley, this activation seems to be triggered by the phytohormone auxin and requires enzymes to separate specific cells from each other to finally open the anthers.

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