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Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)

A common observation in different plant species is a massive abscission of flowers and fruitlets even after adequate pollination, but little is known as to the reason for this drop. Previous research has shown the importance of nutritive reserves accumulated in the flower on fertilization success an...

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Autores principales: Alcaraz, María Librada, Hormaza, José Ignacio, Rodrigo, Javier
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3805557/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24167627
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0078467
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author Alcaraz, María Librada
Hormaza, José Ignacio
Rodrigo, Javier
author_facet Alcaraz, María Librada
Hormaza, José Ignacio
Rodrigo, Javier
author_sort Alcaraz, María Librada
collection PubMed
description A common observation in different plant species is a massive abscission of flowers and fruitlets even after adequate pollination, but little is known as to the reason for this drop. Previous research has shown the importance of nutritive reserves accumulated in the flower on fertilization success and initial fruit development but direct evidence has been elusive. Avocado (Persea americana) is an extreme case of a species with a very low fruit to flower ratio. In this work, the implications of starch content in the avocado flower on the subsequent fruit set are explored. Firstly, starch content in individual ovaries was analysed from two populations of flowers with a different fruit set capacity showing that the flowers from the population that resulted in a higher percentage of fruit set contained significantly more starch. Secondly, in a different set of flowers, the style of each flower was excised one day after pollination, once the pollen tubes had reached the base of the style, and individually fixed for starch content analysis under the microscope once the fate of its corresponding ovary (that remained in the tree) was known. A high variability in starch content in the style was found among flowers, with some flowers having starch content up to 1,000 times higher than others, and the flowers that successfully developed into fruits presented significantly higher starch content in the style at anthesis than those that abscised. The relationship between starch content in the ovary and the capacity of set of the flower together with the correlation found between the starch content in the style and the fate of the ovary support the hypothesis that the carbohydrate reserves accumulated in the flower at anthesis are related to subsequent abscission or retention of the developing fruit.
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spelling pubmed-38055572013-10-28 Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana) Alcaraz, María Librada Hormaza, José Ignacio Rodrigo, Javier PLoS One Research Article A common observation in different plant species is a massive abscission of flowers and fruitlets even after adequate pollination, but little is known as to the reason for this drop. Previous research has shown the importance of nutritive reserves accumulated in the flower on fertilization success and initial fruit development but direct evidence has been elusive. Avocado (Persea americana) is an extreme case of a species with a very low fruit to flower ratio. In this work, the implications of starch content in the avocado flower on the subsequent fruit set are explored. Firstly, starch content in individual ovaries was analysed from two populations of flowers with a different fruit set capacity showing that the flowers from the population that resulted in a higher percentage of fruit set contained significantly more starch. Secondly, in a different set of flowers, the style of each flower was excised one day after pollination, once the pollen tubes had reached the base of the style, and individually fixed for starch content analysis under the microscope once the fate of its corresponding ovary (that remained in the tree) was known. A high variability in starch content in the style was found among flowers, with some flowers having starch content up to 1,000 times higher than others, and the flowers that successfully developed into fruits presented significantly higher starch content in the style at anthesis than those that abscised. The relationship between starch content in the ovary and the capacity of set of the flower together with the correlation found between the starch content in the style and the fate of the ovary support the hypothesis that the carbohydrate reserves accumulated in the flower at anthesis are related to subsequent abscission or retention of the developing fruit. Public Library of Science 2013-10-22 /pmc/articles/PMC3805557/ /pubmed/24167627 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0078467 Text en © 2013 Alcaraz et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Alcaraz, María Librada
Hormaza, José Ignacio
Rodrigo, Javier
Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title_full Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title_fullStr Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title_full_unstemmed Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title_short Pistil Starch Reserves at Anthesis Correlate with Final Flower Fate in Avocado (Persea americana)
title_sort pistil starch reserves at anthesis correlate with final flower fate in avocado (persea americana)
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3805557/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24167627
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0078467
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