Stable oil bodies sheltered by a unique oleosin in lily pollen.

Stable oil bodies were purified from mature lily (Lilium longiflorum Thunb.) pollen. The integrity of pollen oil bodies was maintained via electronegative repulsion and steric hindrance possibly provided by their surface proteins.

Transcriptomic adaptations in rice suspension cells under sucrose starvation.

Sugar is an important resource for energy generation and developmental regulation in plants, and sucrose starvation causes enormous changes in cellular morphology, enzyme activities and gene expression. Genome-wide gene expression profiling provides a comprehensive knowledge of gene expression under nutrient depletion and senescence; however, that of a monocot model plant, rice, under sucrose depletion is still under investigation. Here, the time-course monitoring of gene expression profiles in sucrose-starved rice (Oryza sativa cv Tainung67) suspension cells was investigated by 21495 probes contained in Agilent rice chip.

Gene expression profiles of cold-stored and fresh pollen to investigate pollen germination and growth.

In lily (Lilium longiflorum cv. Avita) pollen cold-stored (-20 degrees C) for 2 months, typical in vitro germination/growth was delayed by about 1 h compared with fresh pollen. We hypothesized that some proteins and mRNAs stored in mature pollen were degraded during storage periods and that re-synthesis of them was essential to resume normal germination and growth.