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An investigation involving the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) has managed, for the first time, accelerating the flowering of a plant by the action of a gene from microalgae. The work, published in Current Biology, could help to improve the yield of crops such as tomato and rice, allowing the best time to produce seeds. According to the authors, the study also attests to the key role of algae, direct predecessors of the plants in their evolution.

CSIC researcher and the study director Federico Valverde, who works at the Instituto de Bioquímica Vegetal y Fotosíntesis (CSIC Joint Center and the University of Seville), contextualizes the research: "A proper flowering is essential for the survival of the plant and therefore directly affects crop productivity. For centuries, farmers have manipulated this feature in order to bring humanity to staple crops like rice, in different environments. "

Following this line, Valverde and his team have succeeded in promoting the flowering plant Arabidopsis thaliana, a model plant widely used in research, through the action of a gene of the microalga hlamydomonas also very present in the laboratory because its genome recently sequenced, is small and easy to handle.

"It's the first time they used a gene from algae to accelerate flowering in plants, which offers tremendous opportunities from the perspective of applied research," says biologist CSIC. The discovery opens the possibility of altering the flowering plants to improve crop yields by choosing the optimal time for them to flower and produce seed, as light and temperature conditions of where they grow.

The group, in fact, this patent application in crops of interest to the food industry such as tomatoes and works in collaboration with biotech companies in their development for crop improvement relevant to the Spanish agricultural production, such as strawberry or pepper.

The work also provides insights into the development and evolution of plants. Rioja Valverde continues: "The find is evidence of how the algae, direct predecessors of the plants developed at least 500 million years of key systems for the regulation of growth, based on the hours of daylight (photoperiod) and in the circadian or biological clock. "

These same processes are preserved at present not only in algae, but also in plants. Therefore, researchers have achieved a gene of an organism as simple in terms of evolving as a microalga accelerate the achievement of a flowering plant, much more complex.

"The gene employee CRCO, resembles the amino acid sequence that encodes a protein Constans, related to the floral transition in plants. The similarity of both genes attests to the conservation of nature and the same flower, based on light and temperature, and makes clear his importance in the evolution of higher organisms from less complex organisms such as microalgae, "extends the CSIC researcher.

Valverde and his team at the CSIC and the University of Seville have done this work in collaboration with the Max Plank Institute for Plant Development, Cologne (Germany).