Plant Biology 2015 in Minneapolis – presenting a poster on ‘The role of the auxin signalling pathway in grape berry development
Abstract
Sarah Moss presented a poster entitled “Auxin signalling and grape development” at the annual meeting for the American Society of Plant Biologists – Plant Biology 2015 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. Attending the conference provided an excellent opportunity to hear some of the most up-to-date global research and to network with a wide-range of researchers for potential future collaborations. Visiting the University of California Davis also allowed for this, as well as exploring their new viticulture and oenology facilities.
Summary
Key information presented at the conference: • Plant hormones play key roles in plant development, from vein formation to floral initiation and fruit development. The methods in which they are regulated within plants are very complex and often involve similar pathways with different key members, e.g. ARF and Aux/IAA in auxin regulation. The processes and family members involved vary between hormones but these can be conserved between species. Chromatin remodelling was indicated to be of utmost importance in regulating hormone responses. Scientists are researching a range of plants including model species as well as financially important crops including rice, wheat, grapevine and maize. • Aux/IAA proteins are important in a range of species and are being widely studied. New protein complexes identified in Arabidopsis can be checked against the work in grape. • Research is being conducted world-wide to combat the issues surrounding climate change, including developing rice plants that are able to survive flooding for >14 days and maize plants that are able to maintain high yields despite drought conditions during key stages of flower and fruit development. • A wide range of grapevine research is being conducted, including research on Phylloxera, characterising floral development to identify the ideal timing for gibberellic acid treatment, and the characters that are being influenced in berry growth and wine due to infection with Botrytis.