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FRAGMENT FROM NATURE continues from last weekend with the theme of jumping genes (transposons) and viruses in Morning Glories and tulips, respectively. The virally-induced genetic changes in flower tissues are somatic and typically not inherited, causing an ephemeral durability of the plants, except when vegetatively propagated, and explaining why some prized gems have vanished. View in LinkedIn

EPHEMERAL BEAUTY. "The broken tulips that once achieved such fame, on the other hand, no longer exist. Weakened as they were by the mosaic virus, the original species—including even famed varieties such as Viceroy and Semper Augustus—were in any case doomed to flourish for only a short time, but even their successors are long gone now; for years the only flared and flamed tulips available to gardeners have been imitations produced by careful cross-breeding." https://lnkd.in/dkNDdDY View in LinkedIn

TULIP BREAKING VIRUS. "So Clusius was the first to discover and explicitly describe the phenomenon of epigenetics already in 1585. This is 430 years ago! The epigenetic effect was caused by a virus - the Tulip Breaking virus TBV, it breaks the colors, therefore this name. It took 400 years, until after World War II for the virus to be discovered." https://lnkd.in/dqpDyTS View in LinkedIn

EPHEMERAL TULIP VARIANTS. "Clusius already noticed in1585 that "broken", multi-colored plants also slowly degenerated: "any tulip thus changing its original colour is usually ruined afterwards and so wanted only to delight its master's eyes with this variety of colors before dying, as if to bid him a last farewell." Striped flowers tended to deteriorate and finally die. He also noticed that uniformly colored flowers were healthy and lived longer." Loss of effect of somatic transposons. https://lnkd.in/dqpDyTS View in LinkedIn

COINCIDENT with the passion for horticulture in the Edo Period in Japan, the Europeans, in particular, the Dutch, had an obsession with the tulip. Given the close relationship of the the Dutch East India Company in Japan and its very active diffusion of Lilies and other plants from Japan to Europe, the possibility exists for at least a second line of bilateral horticultural diffusion between Japan and Holland. View in LinkedIn

VARIANTS ARE POLLINATED DIFFERENTLY. "Populations of the common morning glory in the southeastern US are characterized by a striking diversity of flower color polymorphisms. This diversity is probably a consequence of horticultural escapes from cultivation in the 18th and 19th centuries...some color phenotypes are selected by virtue of their differential attraction to insect pollinators." https://lnkd.in/d2DeZMC View in LinkedIn

MORNING GLORY DNA LIBRARY. "We used a cDNA library from seedlings, and 3 cDNA libraries from flowers and buds of wild-type...to obtain EST sequences, and are now preserving over 60,000 EST clones. The DDBJ and other public database accession numbers for the 25,899 EST sequences obtained from flower and bud full-length cDNA. We are preserving 55,296 BAC clones." https://lnkd.in/d4mmCAr View in LinkedIn

SO ENDS this (coincidental?) linking of Morning Glories from the Edo Period in Japan with the emergence of tulip mania in Europe, linked by the Dutch East India Company. Both were prized for extraordinary flower variants, the first caused by transposons, and the second by a virus. What a luxury to be dedicated to rare flowers, oblivious of a world turned topsy-turvy by megalomaniacs and madness. View in LinkedIn

STREAK VIRUS. "Black flower color of dahlia (Dahlia variabilis). We report that the purple color is not caused by a mutation, as previously thought, but by infection with tobacco streak virus. Tobacco streak virus suppressed post-transcriptional gene silencing and caused a flower color change in black dahlias, which supported the role of cyanidin-based anthocyanins for black flower appearance." https://lnkd.in/dSXuMUE View in LinkedIn

VIRAL ERADICATION. "The bulb industry views the destruction of the mosaic virus as one of its proudest achievements, and with good reason. It is the florists’ equivalent of the elimination of smallpox. Yet it can hardly be denied that something has been lost in the winning of this war. The infinite variety that each broken tulip could display is gone, and with it much of the flower’s capacity to fascinate and astound." https://lnkd.in/dkNDdDY View in LinkedIn