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Pairing and synapsis in wild type Arabidopsis thaliana

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Abstract

A spreading technique was used to perform a structural analysis of prophase I nuclei in pollen mother cells (PMCs) of wild-type Arabidopsis thaliana. In leptotene, all chromosomes developed fully axial elements before a presynaptic alignment was observed. Pairing and synapsis start in regions close to the telomeres at early zygotene. Interstitial synaptonemal complex (SC) stretches were found to occur at several sites per bivalent at mid zygotene. Within individual bivalents, extensive regions of SC formation often existed at the same time as other extensive regions that were unsynapsed. Also in the same nucleus, one bivalent might have several SC segments, while other bivalents have only a few. The classical bouquet was not so evident as in other plant species. Length measurements of the five pachytene bivalents have allowed the elaboration of a pachytene karyotype. Pachytene chromatin compaction in Arabidopsis was significantly less than that observed in the other species analysed and this is paralleled with a higher recombination rate (centimorgans per megabase).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Genética, Facultad de Biología, Universidad Complutense, C/ José Antonio Novais 2, Madrid, 28040, Spain

    Eva López, Mónica Pradillo, Concepción Romero, Juan L. Santos & Nieves Cuñado

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  1. Eva López
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  2. Mónica Pradillo
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  3. Concepción Romero
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  4. Juan L. Santos
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  5. Nieves Cuñado
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Correspondence to Nieves Cuñado.

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López, E., Pradillo, M., Romero, C. et al. Pairing and synapsis in wild type Arabidopsis thaliana . Chromosome Res 16, 701–708 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10577-008-1220-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10577-008-1220-z

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