LOW-COPY-NUMBER MOLECULES ARE PRODUCED BY RECOMBINATION, ACTIVELY MAINTAINED AND CAN BE AMPLIFIED IN THE MITOCHONDRIAL GENOME OF BRASSICACEAE - RELATIONSHIP TO REVERSION OF THE MALE-STERILE PHENOTYPE IN SOME CYBRIDS
M. Bellaoui et al., LOW-COPY-NUMBER MOLECULES ARE PRODUCED BY RECOMBINATION, ACTIVELY MAINTAINED AND CAN BE AMPLIFIED IN THE MITOCHONDRIAL GENOME OF BRASSICACEAE - RELATIONSHIP TO REVERSION OF THE MALE-STERILE PHENOTYPE IN SOME CYBRIDS, MGG. Molecular & general genetics, 257(2), 1998, pp. 177-185
A PCR analysis of mitochondrial (mt) genomes of cybrid rapeseed plants
revealed substoichiometric concentrations of molecules bearing differ
ent configurations of the gene (orf138) responsible for Ogura cytoplas
mic male sterility (CMS). These substoichiometric molecules are also p
resent in plants bearing the unmodified Ogura cytoplasm. In one cybrid
family, which shows reversion of the male sterile phenotype, we obser
ved changes in the respective proportions of these molecules. The phen
otypic (sterility-fertility) reversion occurs as a result of a modific
ation of the equilibrium state between the different forms of the orf1
38 gene and is very probably determined by the level of expression of
this gene. Stable situations are always characterized by one predomina
nt form; the others, when present, exist in substoichiometric amounts.
We report results indicating that the different forms of the orf138 g
ene are continuously interconverted by recombination and that an activ
e mechanism is involved in the maintenance of some substoichiometric m
olecules.