| Plant trichomes are highly specialized epidermal cells implicated in several important processes, including transpiration control, freezing tolerance, and protection against insects, diseases, and UV light. Trichomes are also of special commercial interest because they have a unique secondary metabolism, allowing the production and secretion of various useful natural compounds. Phytochrome is a photoreceptor, which regulates the growth and development of plants and plays an important role for the photomorphogenesis. However, the mechanism of PhyB on the regulation of trichome formation remains uncovered.Our previous data show that the mutation of PhyB results in reduction of the number of trichomes in Arabidopsis, while overexpression of PhyB increases the number of trichomes. Such a phenotype is also red light-denpendent, and PhyBs from soybean and Arabidopsis have similar functions, indicating that PhyB is involved in trichome initiation and development and this function is conserved in plants. This project focuses on the mechanism of PhyB on trichome formation in Arabidopsis by studying the relationship between PhyB and phytohormones during the formation of trichomes and the control mechanism of PhyB downstream genes on the key genes related to trichome morphogenesis. The results of this project hopefully provide a novel line of evidence to elucidate the mechanism of trichome formation, elucidate a novel function for PhyB, and explore its application on crop production.
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