Plant & Cell Physiology
2024 vol65 (5)

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In flowering plants, the pollen tube serves as a vehicle for the transport of two nonmotile sperm cells toward the female gametophyte for double fertilization. To this end, the maintenance and integrity of the pollen tube cell wall is crucial and as such is tightly regulated by various factors. In this issue, Sugi et al. (Pages 704–707) report that blue light irradiation of the pollen tube tips triggers a Ca2+ influx and induces pollen tube rupture. These findings offer insights into the interplay between pollen tube integrity maintenance and Ca2+. Further, blue light-induced pollen tube rupture may also be used as a potent tool for analyzing the rapid fertilization mechanism in flowering plants.
The cover image shows blue light-irradiated Arabidopsis pollen tubes expressing the Ca2+ sensor GCaMP (pseudo color in Fire LUT). The pollen tubes at three hours after pollination in semi in-vivo conditions were irradiated by blue light, which induced pollen tube burst. The cyan octangle shows a restricted irradiation area of blue light.
Photo credit: Naoya Sugi (Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama Ci
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Photo credit: Naoya Sugi (Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama Ci