botanyone
- Tetrad shape and aperture pattern ontogeny in pollen
Patterns of male cytokinesis are suspected to play a role in the diversity of aperture patterns found in pollen grains of angiosperms. By comparing two eudicots, Epilobium roseum and Paranomus reflexus, that exhibit intra-individual variation in aperture number, Abert et al. demonstrate that the positions of apertures are determined by the way additional callose is deposited once the cytoplasms are severed in cytokinesis. The recorded variation in tetrad shape is correlated with variations in aperture pattern, demonstrating the role of cell partitioning in aperture pattern ontogeny.
