Why in the News?
Flowering plants appeared around 130 million years ago and rapidly diversified, puzzling scientists including Charles Darwin, who called it an “abominable mystery”.
A new study by CSIR-CCMB, Hyderabad, has identified the SHUKR gene, which controls pollen development in flowering plants.
About the SHUKR Gene in Flowering Plants
- What is SHUKR? It is a newly discovered gene found in flowering plants like Arabidopsis thaliana. It plays a key role in forming pollen, which plants need to reproduce.
- Function in the Plant Life Cycle: SHUKR is active during the sporophyte phase (the main plant body stage) and helps in producing healthy, viable pollen.
- Effect of Gene Loss: If SHUKR is missing or not working, the plant fails to make good pollen, leading to poor or no reproduction.
- How SHUKR Works: It controls F-box genes, which remove old proteins and replace them with new ones to help pollen grow well.
- Adaptive Advantage: SHUKR and F-box genes evolve quickly, allowing plants to adjust to harsh conditions like heat, cold, or drought.
- Evolutionary Origin: This gene first appeared 125 million years ago in eudicots, a plant group that now includes three-fourths of all flowering plants.
- Why it matters: SHUKR shows that pollen-making is closely linked with the rest of the plant, challenging the earlier belief that these processes were separate.
- Significance: Climate change causes heat-induced pollen damage in flowering plants, but genes like SHUKR could help develop climate-resilient crops.
Back2Basics: Darwin’s “Abominable Mystery”
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| [UPSC 2017] Consider the following statements:
1. Genome sequencing can be used to identify genetic markers for disease resistance and drought tolerance in various crop plants. 2. This technique helps in reducing the time required to develop new varieties of crop plants. 3. It can be used to decipher the host-pathogen relationships in crops. Select the correct- answer using the code given below: Options: (a) 1 only (b) 2 and 3 only (c) 1 and 3 only* (d) 1, 2 and 3 |
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