Altered Expression of PERK Receptor Kinases in Arabidopsis Leads to Changes in Growth and Floral Organ Formation.

The proline-rich, extensin-like receptor kinase (PERK) family is characterized by a putative extracellular domain related to cell wall proteins, followed by a transmembrane domain and kinase domain. The original member, PERK1, was isolated from Brassica napus (BnPERK1) and 15 PERK1-related members were subsequently identified in the Arabidopsis thaliana genome. Ectopic expression and antisense suppression studies were performed using the BnPERK1 cDNA under the control of the 35S CaMV constitutive promoter and introduced into Arabidopsis.