National Key Laboratory of Plant Molecular Genetics, Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology, CAS Centre for Excellence in Molecular Plant Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China.
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
Nat Plants. 2023 Dec;9(12):1968-1977. doi: 10.1038/s41477-023-01555-1. Epub 2023 Nov 6.
Seed plants overtook ferns to become the dominant plant group during the late Carboniferous, a period in which the climate became colder and dryer. However, the specific innovations driving the success of seed plants are not clear. Here we report that the appearance of suberin lamellae (SL) contributed to the rise of seed plants. We show that the Casparian strip and SL vascular barriers evolved at different times, with the former originating in the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of vascular plants and the latter in the MRCA of seed plants. Our results further suggest that most of the genes required for suberin formation arose through gene duplication in the MRCA of seed plants. We show that the appearance of the SL in the MRCA of seed plants enhanced drought tolerance through preventing water loss from the stele. We hypothesize that SL provide a decisive selective advantage over ferns in arid environments, resulting in the decline of ferns and the rise of gymnosperms. This study provides insights into the evolutionary success of seed plants and has implications for engineering drought-tolerant crops or fern varieties.
种子植物在石炭纪晚期取代蕨类植物成为占主导地位的植物群体，这一时期气候变得更冷、更干燥。然而，推动种子植物成功的具体创新尚不清楚。在这里，我们报告说，栓内层（SL）的出现有助于种子植物的兴起。我们表明，凯氏带和 SL 血管屏障是在不同的时间进化的，前者起源于维管植物的最近共同祖先（MRCA），后者起源于种子植物的 MRCA。我们的结果进一步表明，大多数形成栓内层所需的基因是通过种子植物 MRCA 中的基因复制产生的。我们表明，种子植物 MRCA 中 SL 的出现通过防止木质部失水来提高耐旱性。我们假设 SL 在干旱环境中为种子植物提供了决定性的选择优势，导致蕨类植物的衰落和裸子植物的兴起。本研究为种子植物的进化成功提供了新的认识，并对工程耐旱作物或蕨类植物品种具有重要意义。
