Why Arabidopsis Why: Early Flowering Gene
Flowering time is one of the major key factors for plants to skip unfavorable environmental conditions. The genetic circuit for early flowering is well studied in our favorite model plant Arabidopsis thaliana . Like any other posts of this "Why Arabidopsis Why" Series, I'm going to explain how our knowledge about early flowering from Arabidopsis helps to translate it on crop plants. Chickpea is a highly cultivated member of the legume family, mostly in India, Australia, Pakistan, Turkey, Burma, Iran, Canada and the USA. The detrimental threat for chickpea is the invasion of Ascochyta blight. This is caused by the fungal pathogen Ascochyta rabiei (formerly known as Phoma rabiei ). In the asexual stage of its life cycle, it survives mainly on infected seed. Spores of the fungus produced on crop residues are carried into new crops by the wind. Infection can occur regardless of the stage of plant growth, whenever conditions are favourable. Moisture is helpful