Orchid flower ABCs : the science behind flower development and pelorics

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Orchid flower ABCs : the science behind flower development and pelorics By: Halloamey
Hello all, there seem to be many people interested in peloric orchids. As a PhD. student whose work deals with genes responsible for the development of flower, I thought it would be nice to share the science behind orchid flower development and specially Read More...

[Brutal_Dreamer]

Very nice work, Amey! Thanks so much for this great article.

Cheers,
BD

[tcatl]

AWESOME!!!! I love the specific nature and scientific presentation of this article!

[pavel]

Interesting, though I do have a Q, Amey.

You said "3" genes and have presented T1-T3 and t1-t3. So are the capital and lower case designations for dominant and recessive as is often used in genetics or are there actually 6 genes. If the former case, would then the result for an orchid with nothing but two sets of T1-T3 be only outer tepals?

[Halloamey]

Interesting, though I do have a Q, Amey.

You said "3" genes and have presented T1-T3 and t1-t3. So are the capital and lower case designations for dominant and recessive as is often used in genetics or are there actually 6 genes. If the former case, would then the result for an orchid with nothing but two sets of T1-T3 be only outer tepals?

Actually Paul, there are 4 clades (groups) of B genes (the total number of B genes varies in different orchids). Genes of clade 1 and 2 are expressed in the outer tepals, 1,2 and 3 in inner tepals and 1,2,3 and 4 in the lip. The capital T and small t , has nothing to do with the genes, it is just used to denote the tepals, capital for the outer, small for the inner tepals. It is much more complicated because these different B gene clades autoregulate the expression of one another. For eg. The clade 1,2 genes do no allow the clade 3 and 4 genes to be expressed outside the inner tepals and the lips. This is a natural feedback mechanism, but due to repeated mericloning (vegetative reproduction, no sexual reproduction) the mutations accumulate such that one of the gene clades either looses its function completely or partially, thus giving rise to these peloric mutants.

[pavel]

Ah! Interesting! Thanks for the clarification.

[cdayinflorida]

What a great article. It was written in such a way that it made it pretty easy to understand. Thanks!

[Halloamey]

Thanks a lot for the appreciation Cathy !

[yoshiorch]

nice article! I have a couple of peloric phalaenopsis and it helped me better understand the phenomenon

[willynaval]

Excelente trabalho gostei muito.
Google translate: Great job I enjoyed.