Jose M Jimenez-Gomez

Getting a little salt tolerance Plants in a saline environment have no other choice than to adapt. Spanish and French researchers show one of those adaptions in the newly published research “Parallel evolution of salinity toleran…

Like I mentioned last week I like it when plants find a way against all odds. It is not just the perseverance and adaption. But also, that we can learn something from how those pioneering plants manage to survive against all odds. 🧵1/3
🧪 #PlantScience

Congratulation to all authors!
(only @laskotillean.bsky.social in #bluesky?)

Institutions
@cbgpmadrid.bsky.social
@ijpb-versaillescly.bsky.social
@lipme-toulouse.bsky.social
@inrae-france.bsky.social
#GAFL
@csic.es

and funding agencies
@agencerecherche.bsky.social
@ageinves.bsky.social

Parallel evolution in this case could be indicative of positive selection to produce the metabolite in this environment.
Indeed, plants carrying different alleles of GH38cv present different accumulation of the metabolite, and germinate, grow and reproduce better under high salt concentrations.

Looking at genome sequences from a global set of Arabidopsis plants (~1600), only two populations have non-functional aleles of GH38cv, and both come from the Cape Verde archipelago, but each population comes from a different island!
This is a case of parallel evolution!

We performed metabolite QTL analysis in a plant population derived from Cape Verde Islands (Cvi-0) and central Europe (Col-0).
The strongest QTL is in an unidentified metabolite.
We characterize the metabolite as glucuronyl-mannose, and we map the gene to a glycoside hydrolase family 38 (GH38cv).

graphical abstract from the article: Parallel evolution of salinity tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana accessions from Cape Verde Islands

We just published our work in #ScienceAdvances

"Parallel evolution of salinity tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana accessions from Cape Verde Islands"

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Short summary and credits follow:

Congratulation to all authors!
(only @laskotillean.bsky.social in #bluesky?)

Institutions
@cbgpmadrid.bsky.social
@ijpb-versaillescly.bsky.social
@lipme-toulouse.bsky.social
@inrae-france.bsky.social
#GAFL
@csic.es

and funding agencies
@agencerecherche.bsky.social
@ageinves.bsky.social

Parallel evolution in this case could be indicative of positive selection to produce the metabolite in this environment.
Indeed, plants carrying different alleles of GH38cv present different accumulation of the metabolite, and germinate, grow and reproduce better under high salt concentrations.

Looking at genome sequences from a global set of Arabidopsis plants (~1600), only two populations have non-functional aleles of GH38cv, and both come from the Cape Verde archipelago, but each population comes from a different island!
This is a case of parallel evolution!

We performed metabolite QTL analysis with plants from Cape Verde Islands (Cvi-0) and central Europe (Col-0).
The strongest QTL is in an unidentified metabolite.
We characterize the metabolite as glucuronyl-mannose, and we map the gene to a glycosyl hydrolase family 38 (GH38cv)

Parallel evolution of salinity tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana accessions from Cape Verde Islands Plants from the Cape Verde Islands evolved parallel mutations to protect from high salinity.

Our story about salinity tolerance in the Cape Verde islands is out in Science Advances! @science.org. Two independent mutations in the same gene conferred salt resistance to Arabidopsis plants!

Check it out here!

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

These were my very first experiments done at @cbgpmadrid.bsky.social. I still remember the excitement of @jimenezgomez.bsky.social and me when observing the plates and the shocking phenotype!
Thanks to all the authors for the work and so happy to continue working on this!

🧪Very timely, the paper from the story that @jimenezgomez.bsky.social explained us during #SEG2025 was published yesterday. Congrats to all the team and specially first co-author @laskotillean.bsky.social! Beautiful story! 🫶🏻

The quantitative effect of seed production triggers the end of flowering in tomato (María Jesús López-Martín , Cristina Ferrándiz , Concepción Gómez-Mena) doi.org/10.1093/plph... #PlantScience

Our work on MYBs and WRKY regulating suberin in tomato exodermis is now out in @jxbotany.bsky.social!

🍅 doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

👩‍🔬 @leonardojo.bsky.social @riannekluck.bsky.social @marianasartur.bsky.social Sara Buti, Alex Cantó-Pastor @bradylabs.bsky.social

🌱 #PlantScience

Composite image of map of North America, with route of travel. On the side are pictures of myself, Kevin, and a blooming monkeyflower.

Twenty years ago this month Kevin Wright and I set out on an 18,000 mile journey from Durham, NC across North America to collect monkeyflowers. The seeds from that trip (my third rotation project) have given rise to major advances and scores of scientific publications over the past two decades.

Lots of #arabidopsis mixed with the #tulips in the #JardinBotanico in #Madrid. I asked the local expert Carlos Alonso-Blanco: they likely came from Holland with the bulbs or the soil 🤦🏻

An Arabidopsis single-nucleus atlas decodes leaf senescence and nutrient allocation A comprehensive single-nucleus transcriptomic atlas of Arabidopsis across multiple tissues enables the quantification of leaf cell aging state at a single-cell level, highlighting the senescence-relat...

Amazing resource for the Arabidopsis and plant community

www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

Lots of cool new features at the BAR ePlant Browser, such as ecotype SNP data mapped to protein sequence and structure. Check it out at: bar.utoronto.ca/eplant/
#PlantScience @bar-plantbio.bsky.social

Leafy potato flower.

Today’s weird potato flower is one that looks like fasiflora (fa) mutants in tomato, but as usual, nothing is known about this mutation in tuber bearing Solanum.

Pub with the fa mutant in tomato:
www.researchgate.net/profile/Beat...

a cheery green plant grows out of volcanic rock. rock formations and moody clouds glower in the distance.

Solanum galapagense (Galápagos tomato/“tomatillo”)
Isla Santiago, Galápagos

#ASPBPlantCellTuesday #InBrief #ICYMI

spongebob holding a megaphone with the words we need help behind him ALT: spongebob holding a megaphone with the words we need help behind him

Dear #plantsci community, PLEASE HELP or RT! We are looking for a leaf specific promoter for a tissue specific CRISPR experiment in Arabidopsis. Any suggestions?

🚨Job alert: We are looking for a #phd student to join us @unil.bsky.social to study evolution & function of gene regulatory sequences in the context of crop domestication using genome editing and imaging 🌱🍅🧬. #plantscience #scijobs #plantscijobs. Apply here: tinyurl.com/mrdpm5yf

I❤️PhD defense days. We welcome our youngest doctor, Maria Jesus Lopez Martín, who has done an excellent job studying the end of flowering in tomato. Here with proud supervisors @conchagm.bsky.social and @cristicris.bsky.social, the PhD committee and all her mates at @ibmcp.bsky.social

If you see this, quote with flowers from your gallery.
We all can use some beauty right now.

Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1, Georgia O'Keeffe

Fun fact I did not know:
A significant proportion of liver cells are polyploid!

shalevlab.weizmann.ac.il/wp-content/u...

a cartoon says hey everybody an old man 's talking while bart simpson looks on ALT: a cartoon says hey everybody an old man 's talking while bart simpson looks on

Bluetorial-A dream and a bit of a nightmare

Serving as Editor-in-Chief at Science was fascinating. I greatly enjoyed working with talented and committed editorial, news, graphics, and production staff. But the inside look into scientific publishing and AAAS was also deeply disillusioning.

Announcing a curated collection of long-read genomes for Arabidopsis thaliana: The 1001 Genomes Plus Project. Currently 453 unique accessions/almost 600 assemblies.
Interested in contributing? Please contact us!
#plantscience
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...