Rapid customization of Solanaceae fruit crops for urban agriculture.

Cultivation of crops in urban environments might reduce the environmental impact of food production. However, lack of available land in cities and a need for rapid crop cycling, to yield quickly and continuously, mean that so far only lettuce and related 'leafy green' vegetables are cultivated in urban farms. New fruit varieties with architectures and yields suitable for urban farming have proven difficult to breed.

Multiple Auxin-Response Regulators Enable Stability and Variability in Leaf Development.

Auxin-signal transduction is mediated by the antagonistic activity of transcriptional activators and repressors. Both activators and repressors belong to gene families, but the biological importance of this complexity is not clear. Here, we addressed this question using tomato leaf development as a model by generating and analyzing mutants in multiple auxin-response components.

Coordination of auxin-triggered leaf initiation by tomato .

Lateral plant organs, particularly leaves, initiate at the flanks of the shoot apical meristem (SAM) following auxin maxima signals; however, little is known about the underlying mechanisms. Here, we show that tomato () mutants fail to produce cotyledons and leaves and grow a naked pin while maintaining an active SAM. A similar phenotype was observed among pin-like shoots induced by polar auxin transport inhibitors such as 2,3,5-triiodobenzoic acid (TIBA).

Insulin signaling promotes germline proliferation in C. elegans.

Cell proliferation must be coordinated with cell fate specification during development, yet interactions among pathways that control these two critical aspects of development are not well understood. The coordination of cell fate specification and proliferation is particularly crucial during early germline development, when it impacts the establishment of stem/progenitor cell populations and ultimately the production of gametes. In C.