Computational complementation: a modelling approach to study signalling mechanisms during legume autoregulation of nodulation.

Computational complementation: a modelling approach to study signalling mechanisms during legume autoregulation of nodulation.

Blog Article

Gift Card Autoregulation of nodulation (AON) is a long-distance signalling regulatory system maintaining the balance of symbiotic nodulation in legume plants.However, the intricacy of internal signalling and absence of flux and biochemical data, are a bottleneck for investigation of AON.To address this, a new computational modelling approach called "Computational Complementation" has been developed.The main idea is to use functional-structural modelling to complement the deficiency of an empirical model of a loss-of-function (non-AON) mutant with hypothetical AON mechanisms.

If computational complementation demonstrates a phenotype similar to the wild-type plant, the signalling hypothesis would be suggested as "reasonable".Our initial case for application of this approach was to test whether or not wild-type soybean cotyledons provide the shoot-derived inhibitor (SDI) to regulate nodule progression.We predicted by computational complementation that the cotyledon is part of the shoot in terms of AON and that it produces the SDI signal, a result that was confirmed by reciprocal epicotyl-and-hypocotyl grafting in a real-plant experiment.This application demonstrates the feasibility of computational complementation and shows its usefulness for applications where real-plant Grinders experimentation is either difficult or impossible.