Why Brassica?

 

Oilseed rape has emerged as an important agricultural plant and is now the second largest oilseed crop with an annual worldwide production of 38 million tons of oil [7].  Due to its young age as a crop compared to e.g. wheat and barley, oilseed rape still has many 'weedy' characters.  One of these, is unsynchronised pod shatter, where fruits open in the field and seeds fall to the ground.  This is a problem for oilseed rape farmers worldwide, and in the UK pod shattering leads to annual losses of 11-25% [8].

 

Arabidopsis has proven extremely useful as a reference organism for studies in plant biology and huge efforts have been employed to unravel various mechanisms of Arabidopsis growth.  A major challenge is now to demonstrate that this wealth of knowledge can be used for global agricultural and environmental improvement.

Brassica juncea  

Arabidopsis thaliana

 

Brassica and Arabidopsis are members of the Diverse Brassicaceae family and are estimated to have diverged approximately 20 million years ago [8].  This close relationship is also reflected in their similar overall fruit morphologies (see figure above).  The outside of both fruit consists of two valves that are separated along their entire length by a thin structure called the replum, allowing the seed to be released.

 

We have previously shown that ectopic expression of the Arabidopsis FUL gene under the 35S promoter in Brassica juncea, also leads to pod shatter resistant Brassica fruit [9].

WT        

35S:

            1

:FUL

          2

Norwich Research Park,
Colney, Norwich NR4 7UH, UK