Our study provides evidence that the differential expression of the miR2118-triggered miR2118-triggered 21-nt 21-ntbarthii and O. glaberrima may be associated with different rates of determinate meristem fate acquisition during branching stage of phasiRNAdevelopathway
This suggests that for the same morphological stage of panicle development, stamen differentiation, and therefore floret differentiation, might be delayed in O. glaberrima with respect to its wild relative, O. barthii.
While neither mature miR2118 nor 21-nt phasiRNA phasiPH12-1 were detected at the early morphological stage of panicle development (inflorescence meristem after reproductive transition, stage 1), their expression was initiated earlier in O. barthii (early branching stage, stage 2) than in O. glaberrima (late branching stage, stage 3).
Using panicle-derived small RNA transcriptome sequencing in O. glaberrima and its wild ancestor, O. barthii, we showed that 29%% of the 21-nt small RNA population is drastically repressed (or non activated) in cultivated genotypes during the branching stage of panicle development.
Also, Kamiji et al. (2011) reported that N top-dressing during the first stage of panicle development has a large effect on spikelet production, and genotypic differences in spikelet production could be explained by the crop growth rate during the 14-day period before heading.
The GUS activity was detected only at the early stage of panicle development.
OsGRX8 has a significantly higher expression in SAM and stages of panicle development than in other tissues, whereas OsGRX3 seems to be predominantly expressed in late stage of panicle development (P6) and stages of seed development.
Our data from qRT-PCR analysis showed that the gene LOC_Os03g11350 was mainly expressed at the early stage of panicle development.
To make our methylomes from four samples comparable, we carefully collected all samples at the same developmental stage of panicle initiation to booting.
