bHLH-regulated routes in anther development in rice and Arabidopsis.

Anther development is a complex process essential for plant reproduction and crop yields. In recent years, significant progress has been made in the identification and characterization of the bHLH transcription factor family involved in anther regulation in rice and Arabidopsis, two extensively studied model plants. Research on bHLH transcription factors has unveiled their crucial function in controlling tapetum development, pollen wall formation, and other anther-specific processes. By exploring deeper into regulatory mechanisms governing anther development and bHLH transcription factors, we can gain important insights into plant reproduction, thereby accelerating crop yield improvement and the development of new plant breeding strategies. This review provides an overview of the current knowledge on anther development in rice and Arabidopsis, emphasizing the critical roles played by bHLH transcription factors in this process. Recent advances in gene expression analysis and functional studies are highlighted, as they have significantly enhanced our understanding of the regulatory networks involved in anther development.

Going Forward and Back: The Complex Evolutionary History of the GPx.

There is large diversity among glutathione peroxidase (GPx) enzymes regarding their function, structure, presence of the highly reactive selenocysteine (SeCys) residue, substrate usage, and reducing agent preference. Moreover, most vertebrate GPxs are very distinct from non-animal GPxs, and it is still unclear if they came from a common GPx ancestor. In this study, we aimed to unveil how GPx evolved throughout different phyla. Based on our phylogenetic trees and sequence analyses, we propose that all GPx encoding genes share a monomeric common ancestor and that the SeCys amino acid was incorporated early in the evolution of the metazoan kingdom. In addition, classical GPx and the cysteine-exclusive GPx07 have been present since non-bilaterian animals, but they seem to have been lost throughout evolution in different phyla. Therefore, the birth-and-death of GPx family members (like in other oxidoreductase families) seems to be an ongoing process, occurring independently across different kingdoms and phyla.