Epidermal specification mutants of Arabidopsis

生物体的发育需要专门化组织的连续生成。植物表皮是一种特别有趣的组织，因为它是最早建立的组织之一，但它在植物的整个生命过程中继续分化，经历专门化以吸收养分，优化光合作用产量，并确保繁殖成功。这项研究的目的是确定一组特殊的表皮类型--胚珠珠被的形成所需的分子。该方法将通过突变来识别(1)在胚胎中正确定位表皮表达的报告基因所需的基因，以及(2)通过筛选干扰种子形状和粘液生产的突变体来指定珠被所需的基因。这些突变体将根据它们在几个表皮图案决定中的作用来描述，以及最有趣的克隆。通过对这些突变的分析获得的信息将提示组织启动、扩展和保持其特性的方式。这些信息可能揭示了其他组织类型建立所共有的调控回路，或者它可能表明表皮具有独特的发育模式，这与其作为植物与外部世界之间的接口的功能角色有关。对于作物的改良，关于表皮的知识对于植物防御的理解和工程设计以及植物生物材料的生产特别相关。

Development of an organism requires the successive generation of specialized tissues. The plant epidermis is a particularly interesting tissue because it one of the first to be established, yet it continues to differentiate throughout the life of the plant, undergoing specialization to take up nutrients, optimize photosynthetic yields, and ensure reproductive success. The objective of this study is to identify molecules required for the initial formation of the epidermis and later for the development of one set of specialized epidermal types, the ovule integuments. The approach will be to identify, by mutation, (1) genes that are required for the correct localization of an epidermally-expressed reporter gene in the embryo, and (2) genes required for the specification of the integuments by screening for mutants that disturb seed shape and mucilage production. The mutants will be characterized with respect to their role in several epidermal patterning decisions, and the most interesting ones cloned. The information garnered by the analysis of these mutations will suggest ways in which a tissue initiates, expands and maintains its identity. This information may reveal regulatory circuits that are common to the establishment of other tissue types, or it may show that the epidermis has unique developmental patterns that relate to its functional role as the interface between the plant and the outside world. For the improvement of crop plants, knowledge about the epidermis is particularly relevant for the understanding and engineering of plant defenses and for production of plant biomaterials.