Role of MIR159 in reproductive organ development

MIR159 has been previously reported to cause defects in anther development in Arabidopsis; however, the complete spectrum and basis of the defects remained unclear. The study was therefore undertaken to comprehensively investigate the sequence diversity, and role of miR159 from Brassica juncea in modulating vegetative and reproductive traits using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model system. Apart from altered vegetative traits, significantly altered reproductive traits such as filament length, male-meiosis, lignin-deposition pattern in endothecial layers, and size of embryo-sac was found.