Zea mays

fasciated ear4 (fea4) is a semi-dwarfed mutant with fasciated ears and tassels, and greatly enlarged vegetative and inflorescence meristems. Chromatin Immunoprecipitation-sequencing (ChIP-seq) and expression profiling by RNA-seq suggest that fea4 is required to regulate the auxin response and leaf differentiation programs in the periphery of the meristem, suggesting a new mechanism of meristem size regulation that is spatially and mechanistically distinct from the CLV-WUS model. Overall design: To gain insight into transcriptional regulation by FEA4, we used RNA-seq to profile genome-wide expression changes in developing ear primordia of fea4 loss-of-function mutants compared to fea4/+ wild-type (wt) siblings. To map genome-wide occupancy of FEA4 and define its putative transcriptional targets, we performed ChIP-seq using the pFEA4-YFP::FEA4 transgenic lines.