Phytochrome Interaction with PP2A Phosphatases and its effects on Flower Initiation

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All living things depend on a source of energy for their survival. These sources may vary from one species to another. For example, human’s and animal’s main source of energy is food, while plants main source of energy is sunlight. Plants lack the ability to move and look for sources of energy, runaway from predators, or avoid Abiotic stress. Instead, they have Photoreceptors such as chlorophyll found in plants’ chloroplasts which absorbs light and changes it into a cascade of electron transfer that serve as the main source of energy for plants. Moreover, different kinds of proteins regulate the plants life cycle such as phytochrome, cryptochromes, and phototropins. These proteins are mostly pigments that intercept light at different wavelengths and thus each photoreceptor is activated by different light conditions. Using their Photoreceptors, plants transform different light signals to regulate the plant’s growth, development, defense mechanisms, and stress responses. Most of the processes and mechanisms taking place in plant cells usually rely on signaling pathways. These signaling pathways depend on proteins that have different function in activating, inhibiting, or relying the signal from a protein to another. The most important proteins in these signaling pathways are kinases and phosphatases. Studies have recently shown important data that proves the interaction of these photoreceptors and some kinases and phosphatases, for example the interaction of phytochromes with PP2A phosphatases (Bissondial, 2005).

Phosphorylation and dephosphorylation can activate or deactivate a protein but changing in 3-D conformation and as a result changing the ability to interact with other proteins. Just like in Arabidopsis and other an...

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