Abstract
Cucumber plants produce male and female flowers on the same plant. All flower buds contain both stamens and pistils at early bisexual stage, and sexual differences are established by the selective arrest of sexual organ primordia. Arrest of stamen primordia involves programmed cell death (PCD) in female flowers. In animals, extracellular cell matrix (ECM) plays an important role for PCD, morphogenesis, and cell-fate specification. ECM is degraded by matrix metalloproteinase (MMP). Recently, Cs1-MMP which encodes MMP was isolated from cucumber cotyledon, and was demonstrated to be involved in PCD. In the present study, expression of Cs1-MMP in cucumber flower organs was analysed. Expression of Cs1-MMP was great at both sepals and the area where pistil primordia arrested through male flower development. Thus, it is possible that Cs1-MMP at the area where pistil primordia arrested might play an important role for sex differentiation and male flower development in cucumber.
