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Evolution of Sexual Reproduction in Plants

Subject Area Plant Physiology
Term from 2015 to 2019
Project identifier Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 263651209
 
Final Report Year 2019

Final Report Abstract

Modern life depends on flowering plants for food, fuel, textiles, and building materials. However, our capacity to generate sufficient food, animal feed and energy is increasingly compromised by human population expansion, competition for land use, rapid biodiversity loss and predicted global climate change. It is therefore crucial to study the process of sexual reproduction in higher plants to overcome fertilization barriers and to enhance crop productivity. The EVOREPRO project delivers the first comprehensive view of the molecular evolution of plant sexual reproduction and provides insights into the origins of double fertilization in flowering plants. To this end the eight partner laboratories from Europe and the US have taken a comparative gene expression-based approach to investigate regulatory networks underlying sexual reproduction across Marchantia, Physcomitrella, Amborella, Arabidopsis and a range of crop species. The aim was to identify novel and missing key components involved in gamete development and fertilization processes such as germ cell division and specification, gamete interaction and activation, as well as chromatin re-programming and epigenetic inheritance in these cells. The consortium partners have produced novel RNAseq data sets covering gametogenesis, not only for the angiosperm Arabidopsis and the bryophyte Physcomitrella, but also for the first time for the basal angiosperm Amborella. These data sets together with additional ones for the project’s target species comprise the backbone of the EVOREPRO database which was developed to study evolutionary changes in co-expression networks. Analysis of the Amborella egg apparatus transcriptome has already provided unprecedented insights into conserved molecular mechanisms and the evolution of fertilization-related genes. In addition, we have reported functional conservation of the transcription factor DUO1, which is essential for male gametogenesis in bryophytes and angiosperms. Furthermore, the evolution of the membrane insertion motifs of HAP2, a eukaryotic gamete fusogen, was elucidated. In Arabidopsis, a complex mechanism that selectively reprograms H3K27me3 in sperm chromatin has been discovered. This mechanism not only enables expression of the gene network responsible for sperm differentiation, but also primes expression of key genes for several developmental transitions in the next generation. The EVOREPRO database and novel molecular tool sets, including cell-type specific marker lines and methods to study the changes of chromatin states and gene expression levels taking place during gametogenesis, are instrumental in taking research on plant sexual reproduction to the next level. The most recent updates can be found on the project’s webpage: www.evorepro.org

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