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Flower Development: Open Questions and Future Directions

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Flower Development

Part of the book series: Methods in Molecular Biology ((MIMB,volume 1110))

Abstract

Almost three decades of genetic and molecular analyses have resulted in detailed insights into many of the processes that take place during flower development and in the identification of a large number of key regulatory genes that control these processes. Despite this impressive progress, many questions about how flower development is controlled in different angiosperm species remain unanswered. In this chapter, we discuss some of these open questions and the experimental strategies with which they could be addressed. Specifically, we focus on the areas of floral meristem development and patterning, floral organ specification and differentiation, as well as on the molecular mechanisms underlying the evolutionary changes that have led to the astounding variations in flower size and architecture among extant and extinct angiosperms.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Frank Wellmer

  2. School of Biological Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, Australia

    John L. Bowman

  3. Centre for Plant Sciences, School of Biology, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Brendan Davies

  4. Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científi cas-Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, Valencia, Spain

    Cristina Ferrándiz

  5. Plant Gene Expression Center, USDA-ARS/UC, Berkeley, CA, USA

    Jennifer C. Fletcher

  6. Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA

    Jennifer C. Fletcher

  7. Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

    Robert G. Franks

  8. Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland

    Emmanuelle Graciet

  9. Dipartimento di Scienze Biomolecolari e Biotecnologie, Universita degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy

    Veronica Gregis & Martin M. Kater

  10. Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Toshiro Ito

  11. Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Toshiro Ito

  12. Department of Biological Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA

    Thomas P. Jack & Nathanaël Prunet

  13. State Key Laboratory of Plant Genomics, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Yuling Jiao

  14. State Key Laboratory of Genetic Engineering, Institute of Plant Biology, School of Life Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

    Hong Ma

  15. Center for Evolutionary Biology, School of Life Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

    Hong Ma

  16. Division of Biology, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Elliot M. Meyerowitz

  17. Center for Research in Agricultural Genomics CSIC-IRTA- UAB-UB, Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain

    José Luis Riechmann

  18. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Barcelona, Spain

    José Luis Riechmann

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  1. Frank Wellmer
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  2. John L. Bowman
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  3. Brendan Davies
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  4. Cristina Ferrándiz
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  5. Jennifer C. Fletcher
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  7. Emmanuelle Graciet
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  8. Veronica Gregis
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  9. Toshiro Ito
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  10. Thomas P. Jack
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  11. Yuling Jiao
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  12. Martin M. Kater
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  13. Hong Ma
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  14. Elliot M. Meyerowitz
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  15. Nathanaël Prunet
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  16. José Luis Riechmann
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Frank Wellmer , Brendan Davies , Cristina Ferrándiz , Jennifer C. Fletcher , Robert G. Franks , Emmanuelle Graciet , Toshiro Ito , Thomas P. Jack , Yuling Jiao , Hong Ma or José Luis Riechmann .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Research in Agricultural Genomics, Barcelona, Spain

    José Luis Riechmann

  2. Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

    Frank Wellmer

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© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media, New York

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Wellmer, F. et al. (2014). Flower Development: Open Questions and Future Directions. In: Riechmann, J., Wellmer, F. (eds) Flower Development. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 1110. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9408-9_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9408-9_5

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  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4614-9407-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-9408-9

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