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Chiba Tendril-Less locus determines tendril organ identity in melon (Cucumis melo L.) and potentially encodes a tendril-specific TCP homolog

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Abstract

Tendrils are filamentous plant organs that coil on contact with an object, thereby providing mechanical support for climbing to reach more sunlight. Plant tendrils are considered to be modified structure of leaves, stems, or inflorescence, but the origin of cucurbit tendrils is still argued because of the complexity in the axillary organ patterning. We carried out morphological and genetic analyses of the Chiba Tendril-Less (ctl) melon (Cucumis melo) mutant, and found strong evidence that the melon tendril is a modified organ derived from a stem–leaf complex of a lateral shoot. Heterozygous (CTL/ctl) plants showed traits intermediate between tendril and shoot, and ontogenies of wild-type tendrils and mutant modified shoots coincided. We identified the CTL locus in a 200-kb region in melon linkage group IX. A single base deletion in a melon TCP transcription factor gene (CmTCP1) was detected in the mutant ctl sequence, and the expression of CmTCP1 was specifically high in wild-type tendrils. Phylogenetic analysis demonstrated the novelty of the CmTCP1 protein and the unique molecular evolution of its orthologs in the Cucurbitaceae. Our results move us closer to answering the long-standing question of which organ was modified to become the cucurbit tendril, and suggest a novel function of the TCP transcription factor in plant development.

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Abbreviations

LS:

Lateral shoot

TCP:

TEOSINTE BRANCHED1, CYCLOIDER and PROLIFERATING CELL FACTORS1/2

TF:

Transcription factor

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Acknowledgments

We thank the agricultural technicians at the Southern Prefectural Horticulture Institute for cultivating the melon plants; Tetsuo Hirabayashi of the Institute for Horticultural Plant Breeding for kindly providing seeds of TL Takami; Tsutomu Hosouchi and Sayaka Shinpo of the Kazusa DNA Research Institute for genome sequencing; and Tomoko Fujiwara, Ruriko Koyano, Kohei Suzuki, Takashi Sudo, Yuuki Yonehana and Wataru Honmo of Chiba University for providing technical support.

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Author notes

  1. Shinji Mizuno

    Present address: College of Bioresource Sciences, Nihon University, 1866 Kameino, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, 252-0880, Japan

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Southern Prefectural Horticulture Institute, Chiba Prefectural Agriculture and Forestry Research Center, 1762 Yamamoto, Tateyama, Chiba, 294-0014, Japan

    Shinji Mizuno & Toshikatsu Oizumi

  2. Graduate School of Horticulture, Chiba University, 648 Matsudo, Chiba, 271-8510, Japan

    Masatoshi Sonoda, Eisho Nishino & Takahide Sato

  3. Faculty of Horticulture, Chiba University, 648 Matsudo, Chiba, 271-8510, Japan

    Yayoi Tamura

  4. Kazusa DNA Research Institute, 1532-3 Yana, Kisarazu, Chiba, 292-0812, Japan

    Hideyuki Suzuki

  5. Institute for Horticultural Plant Breeding, 2-5-1 Kamishiki, Matsudo, Chiba, 270-2221, Japan

    Toshikatsu Oizumi

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  1. Shinji Mizuno
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  2. Masatoshi Sonoda
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Correspondence to Shinji Mizuno.

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Mizuno, S., Sonoda, M., Tamura, Y. et al. Chiba Tendril-Less locus determines tendril organ identity in melon (Cucumis melo L.) and potentially encodes a tendril-specific TCP homolog. J Plant Res 128, 941–951 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10265-015-0747-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10265-015-0747-2

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