Studies on molecular and genetic characterization of the genes responsible for the multicarpellary gynoecium in thermopsis turcica

Official URL: http://risc01.sabanciuniv.edu/record=b1615053 (Table of Contents)

Thermopsis turcica is a critically endangered endemic plant species in Turkey. The main agricultural trait of T. turcica is having a gynoecium of 2-4 free carpellate-ovaries. Vicia faba is different from T. turcica due to having unicarpellate ovary. In this study, reciprocal crosses between V. faba and T. turcica were made. In the crosses in which T. turcica was used as the paternal parent, globular hybrid embryos were obtained but they were not rescued since embryos were too small for culturing separately from the endosperms. In histological analysis, it was found that pollen tube reached the ovary at the first day of pollination and ovule fertilization occurred on the fourth day of pollination. The data from RT-PCR and sequencing give the first molecular data on the identification of the putative partial homologues of CLV, WUS and FAS were isolated from T. turcica. Due to the sequence similarity, demonstrated that these new isolated partial genes were most probably CLV, WUS, and FAS homologues in T. turcica. In addition, dihydropyrimidine dehydrogenase (NADP+)-like partial sequence which has a phosphate binding domain in T. turcica was isolated. For detailed expression of each ortholog gene, quantitave real-time polymerase chain reaction was implemented and expression patterns were shown. These results might be used for other related crops of economic importance in order to obtain cultivars having polycarpellary feature and are the first scientific report about the molecular basis of the multicarpellary in T. turcica.