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The signal transduction pathways controlling in planta tuberization in potato: an emerging synthesis

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Abstract

Tuberization is one of the multiple outputs of a single-input phytochrome B sensory system, involving several regulatory genes. Phytochrome B- and GA-mediated photoperiodic perception occurs in the leaf, and then the RNA acts as a systemic signal in the long-distance signaling pathway to initiate tuberization in the subapical region of an underground stolon. There is good evidence that flowering and tuberizing signals might be similar. Is there a cross-talk with an oxidative burst-mediated redox signaling pathway during tuberization? Is the lipoxygenase cascade involved in the formation of the perimedullary tissue in a growing tuber? Do aquaporins regulate cell division, expansion and elongation during stolon growth and tuber induction in potato? Is the adaptive diversity for tuberization under varying photoperiods a micro-evolutionary indicator of differential transduction of cell-to-cell signal molecules under spatial and temporal expression of regulatory genes encoding transcriptional activators? Taking these views into consideration, the review presents an interim synthesis of a signaling network regulating in planta tuberization in potato.

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Acknowledgments

I thank the Alexander von Humboldt (AvH) Foundation for a fellowship at the Universität Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany, where some of this work was done. I also thank Dr. SK Pandey, Director, Central Potato Research Institute, Shimla (India) for providing facilities. Comments and suggestions on the manuscript from the editor and two anonymous reviewers are gratefully acknowledged.

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  1. Cell and Molecular Biology Laboratory, Division of Crop Improvement, Central Potato Research Institute (CPRI), Shimla, 171001, Himachal Pradesh, India

    Debabrata Sarkar

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  1. Debabrata Sarkar
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Correspondence to Debabrata Sarkar.

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Communicated by P. Kumar.

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Sarkar, D. The signal transduction pathways controlling in planta tuberization in potato: an emerging synthesis. Plant Cell Rep 27, 1–8 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00299-007-0457-x

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