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Regulation of flowering time by FVE, a retinoblastoma-associated protein

Nature Genetics volume 36, pages 162–166 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

The initiation of flowering in plants is controlled by environmental and endogenous signals1,2. Molecular analysis of this process in Arabidopsis thaliana indicates that environmental control is exerted through the photoperiod and vernalization pathways, whereas endogenous signals regulate the autonomous and gibberellin pathways. The vernalization and autonomous pathways converge on the negative regulation of FLC3,4, a gene encoding a MADS-box protein that inhibits flowering3,4. We cloned FVE, a component of the autonomous pathway that encodes AtMSI4, a putative retinoblastoma-associated protein. FVE interacted with retinoblastoma protein in immunoprecipitation assays, and FLC chromatin was enriched in acetylated histones in fve mutants. We conclude that FVE participates in a protein complex repressing FLC transcription through a histone deacetylation mechanism. Our data provide genetic evidence of a new developmental function of these conserved proteins and identify a new genetic mechanism in the regulation of flowering.

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Figure 1: Phenotype and genotype of fve mutants.
Figure 2: Molecular characterization of FVE.
Figure 3: Interaction between FVE and the maize retinoblastoma protein ZmRBR1.
Figure 4: Effect of fve mutations on FLC histone acetylation by ChIP analysis.

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Acknowledgements

We thank M. Koornneef, F. Schomburg, R. Amasino and Y. Komeda for providing the seeds of fve-1, fve-2, fve-3 and fve-4 mutants, respectively; M. Koornneef and W. Soppe for providing a Ler genomic library; S. Michaels and R. Amasino for a FLC cDNA clone; and C. Gutierrez and J. del Pozo for supplying the ZmRBR1 protein and the corresponding antibody. This work has been supported by grants from the European Union and from the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología. I.A. was supported by predoctoral fellowship from the Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Tecnología Agraria y Alimentaria. C.A.-B. was supported by a contract “Ramón y Cajal” from the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología.

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Author notes

  1. Israel Ausín and Carlos Alonso-Blanco: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Genética Molecular de Plantas, Centro Nacional de Biotecnología, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Campus de la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Cantoblanco, Madrid, 28049, Spain

    Israel Ausín, Carlos Alonso-Blanco, Leonor Ruiz-García & José M Martínez-Zapater

  2. Departamento de Biotecnología, Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Tecnología Agraria y Alimentaria, Carretera de A Coruña, km 7, Madrid, 28040, Spain

    Carlos Alonso-Blanco, José A Jarillo & José M Martínez-Zapater

Authors
  1. Israel Ausín
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  2. Carlos Alonso-Blanco
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  3. José A Jarillo
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  4. Leonor Ruiz-García
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  5. José M Martínez-Zapater
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Correspondence to José M Martínez-Zapater.

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Ausín, I., Alonso-Blanco, C., Jarillo, J. et al. Regulation of flowering time by FVE, a retinoblastoma-associated protein. Nat Genet 36, 162–166 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng1295

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