About this Research Topic
Note: We are pleased to introduce the series 'Model Organisms in Plant Science'. Model organisms represent an invaluable resource for fundamental and applied research, allowing prediction studies, modeling, and the identification of action mechanisms. This article collection will showcase studies on petunia that have significance to the field of plant science as a whole.
Petunia is an important ornamental crop and established model in plant research. For decennia, this species is setting the scene in different fields including plant development, pollination syndrome studies, secondary metabolite biosynthesis, and much more. This has been possible due to the establishment of a permanent collection of lines and its continuous expansion among others, a very active system of transposon elements that generate new mutants in all kinds of different crosses. Recently, the publication of the genome of the species has improved its use as model in plant sciences.
Petunia, a member of the Solanaceae family, a species from Asterids clade, showed many differences in the presence/absence of genes involved, for instance, in the organization of cellular endomembrane compartments and in the choice for interaction with the environment and microbes. In addition, within the species, Petunia has adapted to be pollinated by different animal species and thus represents a wide variety of research opportunities. Plant sciences research has been largely dominated by the model plant Arabidopsis, however, the translation of Arabidopsis-derived information to plants with more complex traits is often difficult and the evolution studies also require comparison among different species. Here we collect the most recent advances in plant sciences to which petunia contributed to open new perspectives and even interpretation of specific phenomena.
We will highlight similarities and differences with processes earlier described in other species (regulating plant growth, reproduction studies, interaction with microorganisms and environment) and we will scratch an outline of the contribution of this model system in plant science.
We welcome submissions of original research papers, reviews, and methods, including (but not limited to) research on the following sub-themes:
- From a garden delight to a lab model: what a plant needs to be a useful model system
- Symbiotic and pathogenic microbe interactions in Petunia
- Genetics and molecular control of flower development
- Evolutionary dynamics of repetitive DNA and gene regulators in petunia
- Molecular and phytohormonal control of root and shoot development
- Epigenetics
- Secondary metabolites
Petunia is an important ornamental crop and established model in plant research. For decennia, this species is setting the scene in different fields including plant development, pollination syndrome studies, secondary metabolite biosynthesis, and much more. This has been possible due to the establishment of a permanent collection of lines and its continuous expansion among others, a very active system of transposon elements that generate new mutants in all kinds of different crosses. Recently, the publication of the genome of the species has improved its use as model in plant sciences.
Petunia, a member of the Solanaceae family, a species from Asterids clade, showed many differences in the presence/absence of genes involved, for instance, in the organization of cellular endomembrane compartments and in the choice for interaction with the environment and microbes. In addition, within the species, Petunia has adapted to be pollinated by different animal species and thus represents a wide variety of research opportunities. Plant sciences research has been largely dominated by the model plant Arabidopsis, however, the translation of Arabidopsis-derived information to plants with more complex traits is often difficult and the evolution studies also require comparison among different species. Here we collect the most recent advances in plant sciences to which petunia contributed to open new perspectives and even interpretation of specific phenomena.
We will highlight similarities and differences with processes earlier described in other species (regulating plant growth, reproduction studies, interaction with microorganisms and environment) and we will scratch an outline of the contribution of this model system in plant science.
We welcome submissions of original research papers, reviews, and methods, including (but not limited to) research on the following sub-themes:
- From a garden delight to a lab model: what a plant needs to be a useful model system
- Symbiotic and pathogenic microbe interactions in Petunia
- Genetics and molecular control of flower development
- Evolutionary dynamics of repetitive DNA and gene regulators in petunia
- Molecular and phytohormonal control of root and shoot development
- Epigenetics
- Secondary metabolites
Keywords: development, cell biology, microbe-interaction, evolution, germplasm, model plant
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
