Michitaka Notaguchi

Day length perceived by a leaf is a major environmental factor that controls the timing of flowering. It has been believed that a mobile, long-distance signal called florigen is produced in the leaf under inductive day length conditions, and is transported to the shoot apex where it triggers floral morphogenesis. Grafting experiments have shown that florigen is transmissible from a donor plant that has been subjected to inductive day length to an uninduced recipient plant. However, the nature of

Plant grafting is conducted for fruit and vegetable propagation, whereby a piece of living tissue is attached to another through cell-cell adhesion. However, graft compatibility limits combinations to closely related species, and the mechanism is poorly understood. We found that <i>Nicotiana</i> is capable of graft adhesion with a diverse range of angiosperms. Comparative transcriptomic analyses on graft combinations indicated that a subclade of β-1,4-glucanases secreted into the extracellular r

Plant vascular systems are constructed by specific cell wall modifications through which cells are highly specialized to make conduits for water and nutrients. Xylem vessels are formed by thickened cell walls that remain after programmed cell death, and serve as water conduits from the root to the shoot. In contrast, phloem tissues consist of a complex of living cells, including sieve tube elements and their neighboring companion cells, and translocate photosynthetic assimilates from mature leav

Phloem is a conductive tissue that allocates nutrients from mature source leaves to sinks such as young developing tissues. Phloem also delivers proteins and RNA species, such as small RNAs and mRNAs. Intensive studies on plant systemic signaling revealed the essential roles of proteins and RNA species. However, many of their functions are still largely unknown, with the roles of transported mRNAs being particularly poorly understood. A major difficulty is the absence of an accurate and comprehe

In plants, the phloem is the component of the vascular system that delivers nutrients and transmits signals from mature leaves to developing sink tissues. Recent studies have identified proteins, mRNA, and small RNA within the phloem sap of several plant species. It is now of considerable interest to elucidate the biological functions of these potential long-distance signal agents, to further our understanding of how plants coordinate their developmental programs at the whole-plant level. In thi

Grafting has long been an important technique in agriculture. Nowadays, grafting is a widely used technique also to study systemic long-distance signaling in plants. Plants respond to their surrounding environment, and at that time many aspects of their physiology are regulated systemically; these start from local input signals and are followed by the transmission of information to the rest of the plant. For example, soil nutrient conditions, light/photoperiod, and biotic and abiotic stresses af

In angiosperms, pollen tubes carry two sperm cells toward the egg and central cells to complete double fertilization. In animals, not only sperm but also seminal plasma is required for proper fertilization. However, little is known regarding the function of pollen tube content (PTC), which is analogous to seminal plasma. We report that the PTC plays a vital role in the prefertilization state and causes an enlargement of ovules without fertilization. We termed this phenomenon as pollen tube-depen

Grafting techniques have been applied in studies of systemic, long-distance signaling in several model plants. Seedling grafting in Arabidopsis, known as micrografting, enables investigation of the molecular mechanisms of systemic signaling between shoots and roots. However, conventional micrografting requires a high level of skill, limiting its use. Thus, an easier user-friendly method is needed. Here, we developed a silicone microscaled device, the micrografting chip, to obviate the need for t

Plant grafting is a maneuver humans learned from nature and has been practiced since ancient times. The technique has long been applied for efficient propagation as well as for the modification of the traits of interest, such as stress tolerance, tree size, and fruit quality. Since grafting can enhance the environmental tolerance and disease resistance of a plant, its techniques are now used not only in tree species but also among vegetables. Despite such wide advantages of grafting, however, th

Day length perceived by a leaf is a major environmental factor that controls the timing of flowering. It has been believed that a mobile, long-distance signal called florigen is produced in the leaf, and is transported to the shoot apex where it triggers floral morphogenesis. Grafting experiments have shown that florigen is transmissible from a donor plant that has been subjected to inductive day length to an un-induced recipient plant. However, the nature of florigen has long remained elusive.

Plant grafting is conducted for vegetative propagation in plants, whereby a piece of living tissue is attached to another tissue through establishment of cell–cell adhesion. Plant grafting has a long history in agriculture and has been applied to improve crop traits for thousands of years 1 . Plant grafting has mostly relied on the natural ability of a plant for wound healing. However, the compatibility of cell–cell adhesion typically limits graft combinations to closely related species 2–4 , an

Grafting is a plant propagation technique widely used in agriculture. A recent discovery of the capability of interfamily grafting in <i>Nicotiana</i> has expanded the potential combinations of grafting. In this study, we showed that xylem connection is essential for the achievement of interfamily grafting and investigated the molecular basis of xylem formation at the graft junction. Transcriptome and gene network analyses revealed gene modules for tracheary element (TE) formation during graftin