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  • Florigen Concept Botany

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    Paramartha Banerjee
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    The document discusses photoperiodism in plants. It summarizes that photoperiodic stimulus is perceived by leaves, which then produce a floral hormone that is transported to the apical meristems to induce flowering. Experiments with cocklebur plants show that if leaves are exposed to short days, the plant will flower, even if other leaves are kept in long days or removed. The document also discusses evidence that a mobile signal called "florigen" transports the floral induction signal between leaves and shoots, and that this signal may be an RNA or protein.

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    The document discusses photoperiodism in plants. It summarizes that photoperiodic stimulus is perceived by leaves, which then produce a floral hormone that is transported to the apical meristems to induce flowering. Experiments with cocklebur plants show that if leaves are exposed to short days, the plant will flower, even if other leaves are kept in long days or removed. The document also discusses evidence that a mobile signal called "florigen" transports the floral induction signal between leaves and shoots, and that this signal may be an RNA or protein.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    3K views10 pages

    Florigen Concept Botany

    Uploaded by

    Paramartha Banerjee
    The document discusses photoperiodism in plants. It summarizes that photoperiodic stimulus is perceived by leaves, which then produce a floral hormone that is transported to the apical meristems to induce flowering. Experiments with cocklebur plants show that if leaves are exposed to short days, the plant will flower, even if other leaves are kept in long days or removed. The document also discusses evidence that a mobile signal called "florigen" transports the floral induction signal between leaves and shoots, and that this signal may be an RNA or protein.

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    of 10

    Topic: PHOTOPERIODISM

    Course Title: PLANT PHYSIOLOGY AND METABOLISM

    Paper: BOT-G-CC-4-4-TH

    Unit: 8

    Semester: IV

    Name of the Teacher: Mrs. Rinku Halder Sahu

    Name of the Department: Botany (Morning)


    Perception of the Photoperiodic Stimulus and Presence of a Floral 
    Hormone: 

    I​t is now well established that the​ photoperiodic stimulus is perceived


    by the leaves.​ As a result, a floral hormone is produced in the leaves
    which is then translocated to the apical tip, subsequently causing the
    initiation of floral primordia.

    That the photoperiodic stimulus is perceived by the leaves can be shown


    by simple ex​periments on cocklebur (​Xanthium pennsylvanicum​), a short
    day plant.

    ● Cocklebur plant will flower if it has previously been kept under


    short-day conditions (Fig. 18.2 A).
    ● If the plant is defoliated and then kept under short day condition, it will
    not flower (Fig. 18.2 B).
    ● Flowering will also occur even if all the leaves of the plant except one
    leaf have been removed (Fig. 18.2 C).
    ● If a cocklebur plant, whether intact or defoliated, is kept under long
    day conditions it will not flower (Fig. 18.2 D, E).
    ● But, if even one of its leaves is exposed to short day conditions and
    the rest are under long day photoperiods, flowering will occur (Fig.
    18.2 F).
    The photoperiodic stimulus can be transmitted from one branch of
    the plant to another branch.​ For example,

    ● If in a two branched cocklebur plant one branch is exposed to short


    day and other to long day photoperiod, flowering occurs on both the
    branches (Fig. 18.3 A).
    ● Flowering also occurs if one branch is kept under long day conditions
    and another branch from which all the leaves except one have been
    removed is exposed to short day condition (Fig. 18.3 B).
    ● However, if one branch is exposed to long photoperiod and the other
    has been defoliated under short day condition, flow​ering will not occur
    in any of the branches (Fig. 18.3 C).
    Gibberellins and the Flowering Response:  
    It is often proposed​ ​that Pfr stimulates gibberellin production and this GA in
    turn stimulates the production of floral hormone called florigen.
    Importance of GA is due to the following effects of that hormone:
    1. External GA can mimic the effect of red light in some cases.
    2. GA prompts flowering in some LDPs under short day conditions,
    mainly rosette plants which bolt before flowering.
    3. GA also inhibits flowering in some SDPs.
    4. Anti gibberellin nullifies the above effect of GA.
    5. Natural GA from induced LDP also causes flowering in non induced
    plants.
    Although GA can induce flowering but they can not be considered to be the
    primary floral hormone mainly because of the following reasons:
    1. In LDPs, vegetative growth and differentiation of floral primordia
    occur simultaneously but GA on the other hand first stimulates
    vegetative growth (bolting) and then only floral primordia are
    formed.
    2. GAs have been unable to induce flowering in all short day
    plants under a non inductive cycle.
    Florigen concept: 

    ​A mobile molecule that is synthesized in leaves in response to the


    favourable photoperiod and it migrates through the vascular system to the
    apical meristem to promote floral initiation.

    The name florigen has been proposed by Chailakhyan (1936) for the
    unknown chemical stimulus acting as floral hormone. The significant
    evidence of the existence of that substance comes from interspecific
    grafting experiments.

    Grafting experiment of florigen existence: 

    ● Chailakhyan removed the leaves from the upper half of


    Chrysanthemum​ (SDP) but left the leaves on lower half untouched.
    ● He then exposed the lower half to a short day- the plant did not
    flower.
    ● He concluded that day length does not have an effect directly on the
    buds but causes the leaves to manufacture a hormone that moves
    from the leaves to the buds and induce flowering.
    ● He concluded that floral stimulus is translocated from the leaf of one
    photo induced plant to another non photo induced plant.
    ● Florigen is believed to be synthesized in the photo induced leaf and
    from there moved to the shoot apices for floral evocation , through
    phloem.
    Grafting experiments in cocklebur plants ​(​Xanthium strumarium)​ have even
    proved that the floral hormone can be trans located from one plant to
    another. For example,

    ● if one branched cocklebur plant (Fig. 18.4 A) which has been


    exposed to short day conditions is grafted to another cocklebur plant
    kept under long day conditions, flowering occurs on both the plants
    (Fig. 18.4 B).
    ● Obviously the flo​ral hormone has been transmitted to the receptor
    plant through graft union.
    ● But if a cocklebur plant is grafted to another similar plant both of
    which have been kept under long day condi​tions, flowering will not
    occur on either of the two plants (Fig. 18.4 C).
    It has also been indicated that the floral hormone may be identical in
    short-day and long- day plants. For example, grafting experiments between
    certain long-day plants (eg: ​Silene armeria)​ and short-day plants( e.g:
    Xanthium strumarium)​ have shown that flowering occurs on both the plants
    even if one of them has been kept under non-inductive photoperiods.

    But Hamner and Bonner (1938) tested about 246 different kinds of extracts
    from SDPs, LDPs, and DNPs but none had any flower evoking effect in non
    -inductive plants. So, it is believed that floral stimulus ( florigen) may have
    several components which interact with one another in such a way that
    some biochemical and cellular changes initiate floral primordia.

    Chailakhyan later modified his florigen concept and proposed that

    ● Florigen is two hormones rather than one, a ​gibberellin​ and a


    hypothetical hormone, he called ​anthesin​.
    ● He suggested that LDPs can produce anthesin under any day length
    but GA only under long days,
    ● SDPs can produce gibberellins under any day length but anthesin
    only under short day,
    ● DNPs can produce both anthesin and GA in any day length.
    ● Thus a plant can flower only when both GA and anthesin are present.
    According to a scheme proposed by Brian (1958), a gibberellin like
    hormone is produced in the leaves during the photoperiod somewhat
    as follows:

    The precursor may be slightly stimulatory or inactive or antagonistic to the


    gibberellin-like hormone. Red irradiations promote the conversion of the
    precursor to the gibberellin-like hor​mone. In the dark there is a slow
    reconversion of the gibberellin-like hormone to the precursor.

    This reconversion is accelerated by far-red irradiations. It is further


    presumed that high concentration of the gibberellin-like hormone leads to
    the synthesis of florigen in long-day plants. In short-day plants the
    synthesis of florigen takes place when the level of gibberellin-like hormone
    is low. But, flowering eventually follows once the florigen synthesis has
    taken place in both the cases.

    The whole scheme is diagrammatically shown below:


    Nature of the Floral Hormone: 
    Recent researches are indicative of ‘florigen’ to be a macromolecule unlike
    other plant growth hormones which are rather small molecules. This
    macromolecule may possibly be a RNA or protein molecule which is trans
    located from the leaf to the apical tips (or meristems) via phloem in
    photo-induced plants (Corbesier and Coupland, 2005).

    I​n ​Arabidopsis thaliana​, some researchers have identified this signal as


    mRNA coded by the ​FLOWERING LOCUS T​ (​FT​) gene, others as the
    resulting ​FT​ protein. First report of FT mRNA being the signal transducer
    that moves from leaf to shoot apex. However, in 2007 another group of
    scientists made a breakthrough saying that it is not the mRNA, but the FT
    Protein that is transmitted from leaves to shoot, possibly acting as
    "Florigen".
    Here FT acts like a molecular “alarm-clock”, evoking a complex genetic
    scenario, which culminates in flower formation.

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